“To me, football is so much about mental toughness, it’s digging deep, it’s doing whatever you need to do to help a team win and that comes in a lot of shapes and forms”— Tom Brady,
Mental Toughness describes the mind-set that every person adopts in everything they do. Or, as one football psychologist puts it, mental toughness is “the ability to consistently perform toward the upper range of your talent and skill regardless of competitive circumstances.” It is closely related to qualities such as character, resilience, grit, etc.
It is not simply a matter of athlete’s knowledge, ability and skill in football. It is also their psychological preparedness for the game, including skill in dealing with the stress of strong competition, recovering from mistakes and failure quickly, determining strategies to tackle tough situations, adjusting with each circumstance and game, collaborating with a team, celebrating successes but not becoming overconfident and keeping positive before, during and after the game.
Research tells us that top competitive athletes succeed because of their physical talents and their dedication to training. However, they also succeed because of their dexterity in dealing with the psychological pressures of a game.
In short, football mental toughness and resilience are tremendously important for any athlete aiming to be the best in the football mental game.
Mental toughness is also one of the key skills for career progression. Being mentally tough enables athletes to embrace adversity and failure, learn, adapt, and come back stronger.
Another huge benefit is being able to avoid over-reacting in uncomfortable situations.
There are at least three markers of mental toughness from sports psychology for football that apply in every competitive situations and important for developing players football mind-set.
Flexibility – Mentally tough athletes have the ability to absorb the unexpected and remain supple and non-defensive. They maintain their football confidence, focus, motivation and self-belief even when the situation becomes tough. If something isn’t going well or doesn’t turn out as expected, they remain flexible in their approach and look for new ways to solve the problem.
Responsiveness – Mentally tough athletes remain engaged, alive and connected with a situation when under pressure. They are constantly identifying the opportunities, challenges, and threats in the environment. They understand that they need to think differently about how their environment operate.
They look for new ways to think about these problems and, more importantly, look for fresh ways out of these problems. They have a sense of urgency about responding to the changing face of the game.
Just as a coach may change strategies at halftime in response to the way a game is going based on the opponent’s strengths and weaknesses, mentally tough athletes respond to changes in the environment and the players.
Strength – Mentally tough athletes exert and resist great force when under pressure and to keep going against insurmountable odds. They find the strength to dig deep and garner the resolve to keep going, even when in a seemingly losing game. They focus on giving their best and fighting hard until the end, with persistent intensity throughout the game.
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