Welcome to the GP Soccer Podcast! (S14 E13)

                         Welcome to the GP Soccer Podcast!  (S14 E13)

Proud member of the Sports History Network and endorsed by the National                                                  Soccer Coaches Association of Canada.     

Host Giovanni Pacini welcomes his worldwide audience to yet another exciting show. Don't forget this season will feature World Cup "bonus content" during the World Cup.

This week's "Conversation with the Coach" is with Dan Abrahams, noted sport psychology expert and author of a new book entitled- "Compete". "Coaches Corner" features Paul Robinson where he discusses the importance of arrival activities. "News and Analysis" will feature Giovanni Pacini with news from the AP and Ralph Ferrigno checks in with commentary regarding season ending matches and UEFA competitions. The "American Soccer Revolution" features a piece from Matt Dumouchelle where the topic is retention of youth sports players.

The GP Soccer Podcast features new shows every Wednesday and can be found anywhere you listen to your podcasts. Listeners are encouraged to "Like" and "Subscribe" the GP Soccer Podcast and share the show amongst those within their social media network! Those interested in advertising on the show can contact host Giovanni Pacini at gp4soccer@yahoo.com. And be sure to check out the show website at www.gpsoccerpodcast.com. 

                    GP Soccer Podcast enjoys continued support from-
United Goalkeeping Alliance - Music Meets Sports - National Soccer Coaches Association of Canada - The Sports History Network - Feedspot.com - GP Voice Over Services - Zone 14 Coaching

GP Soccer Podcast welcomes a new sponsor- Zone 14 Coaching! Check it out at Zone14coaching.com. Use promo code GP20 for 20% off!

To purchase a signed copy of Dr. Joe Machnik's book- "From the Sandlots to the World Cup: 7 Decades of American Soccer", e-mail "Dr. Joe" at joemachnik@no1soccercamps.com. Be sure to mention the GP Soccer Podcast!

Enjoy the show!

Transcript

SPEAKER_09 1:20

Well, hey there, everyone. Giovanni Piccini here, your host of the GP Soccer Podcast. Welcome to all of you, my wonderful listening audience from literally around the world. Well, listen, we are we are winding down. I can't believe this. But we're winding down season 14 with um three more episodes to go. However, uh I will be putting out some bonus World Cup content beginning on June the 24th through the end of the tournament. So even though season 14 is winding down, the GP Soccer Podcast will certainly be around covering all things World Cup. Speaking of which, we got about 16 days as I record this uh show for today, 16 days until the opening of the World Cup that will be held in the United States of America, Canada, and Mexico. Uh it's getting closer and closer, and uh lots of things to talk about, not the least of which, tease tease, hint hint, the announcement of the U.S. Men's National Team. We'll get into that uh toward the end of the block. Terrific show today, terrific show. Conversation with the coach, a returning guest, and someone who I really enjoy talking to, whether it's formally here on my show or informally when we get together at coaching symposiums and conventions and that type of thing. And that is Dan Abrahams. And Dan is um one of the world's leading leading sports psychologists and author of a new book, which is entitled Compete: Developing a Mental Playbook for Performance Under Pressure in Sport. You're going to enjoy that conversation. In Coach's Corner, our terrific Paul Robinson returns, where he talks about the importance of arrival activities. Soccer news and analysis with yours truly, and news from the Associated Press, and our European soccer report uh will be led by Ralph Ferrigno. You know Ralph so well. His uh commentary uh this week will be the season-ending matches and qualifiers for the UEFA competitions. In the American Soccer Revolution, I'm going to be sharing you some content from Matt Dumichel. And Matt is the creator of the Youth Sports Systems Health Guide, and he's going to be talking about, or I will be talking about actually, uh, retention of youth sports players. That's a big issue. That's a big problem here in the United States of America, where we lose so many uh young athletes at very, very young ages. Well now, checking boxes, checking boxes, checking boxes. Well, there's really only one box to check, and that is uh the announcement, which took place today, of the U.S. Men's national team. So this was probably the worst kept secret out there, uh, the actual roster for the U.S. men's national team. But I wanted to wait till it was official, and now that it's official, we can report uh, I guess, uh, the those uh lucky guys who made the squad. So Giano, Giano and the uh New England Revolution, and our own Revs, uh Matt Turner, are in. Diego Luna is out, and there are several other surprises uh as multiple outlets, uh, as I said, it's the worst kept secret, confirmed that uh Coach Morisha Puchettino's United States men's soccer squad for the coming uh FIFA World Cup. Uh, The Guardian was the first to report the news. I guess they were the first ones to kind of leak it, I guess, uh, which was independently confirmed by the Athletic and other outlets. Um, the squad uh has been officially announced, uh, and the players were all uh informed this past Friday. Now, Matt Turner uh joins uh New York City FC's Matt Freeze and Chicago Fires uh Chris Brady as the chosen goalkeepers, uh, with Freeze expected to be the number one uh goalkeeper. Veteran Captain Tim Rehm joins Chris Richards, uh, Austin Trustee, Miles Robinson, and Mark McKenzie as center backs. And they are joined by winged backs, uh Anthony Robinson, Shardinio Dest, uh Alex Freeman, Joe Scally, and Max Arson. Seattle Sounders, midfielder, Christian Roldan will join Sebastian Burrhalter and Tyler Adams on the roster. A surprising omission, I think, uh was midfielder Tanner Tessman. And he started 22 of 29 games for Lyon in France's league this season. Um in the attacking midfielder, we have Weston McKenny, no surprise here. And he joins Club America winger Alejandro Zendejas. Uh we have obviously our resident superstar, Christian Pelic, Malik Tillman, uh Rayner, as I noted earlier, Timmy Weyah, and Brendan Aronson. The Ford group is led by Follow and Belligan, but also includes Ricardo Pepe in the uh 2022 World Cup goalscorer, Haji Wright. Uh the U.S. will open up uh group D play on June 12th versus Paraguay at uh SoFi Stadium outside of Los Angeles. So there you have it, folks. There is your U.S. men's national team. Um the only the only player that was admitted that that I was disappointed was Diego Luna. Uh I, as I look at this roster of all the field plays, we'll put the goalkeepers for a side, there is a there is a some commonality in terms of their game, their physicality, how they're built. There's a lot of continuity there. Diego Luna was not of that ilk, shall we say. However, a player like Diego Luna is such a dynamic component when he gets out in the field. His creativity, um, you know, the things that you don't expect a player to do when they're out there. As many great players, many great creative players will do, um, he's not part of that, not part of this squad. And that I find that to be very, very uh disappointing. And what makes it even more disappointing that I know that U.S. Soccer used him as the poster child, if you will, for the upcoming World Cup, and to not have him on the squad, um, well, again, it's very, very disappointing. So there you have it, uh, the uh the U.S. men's national team roster that will be competing in uh this uh uh this year's World Cup, and a little bit of commentary from yours truly. Should be interesting. Should be very, really, really interesting. So, with that said, that's the this is the closing of the opening block, the A-block, as we uh like to call it, in the radio world or the podcast world of the Cheapy Soccer Podcast. We're gonna break for a couple of commercial messages. You know how that works, we'll re-engage on the other side. Don't you dare go anywhere.

SPEAKER_10 7:25

Youth soccer has changed. Expectations are higher, but systems haven't kept up. Coaches juggle endless tasks, players chase progress that they can't measure, and clubs struggle to create consistency across teams. Zone 14 Coaching was built for this moment. A company built by coaches or coaches, Zone 14 coaching next generation journals with coaches and players help plan every practice, reflect on what worked, and track progress all season long. Built on intentional coaching and backed by neuroscience, Zone 14 coaching brings structure and purpose to your training. The founders of Zone 14 Coaching watched it all as some of the game's best tacticians and mentors spent every precious moment with a simple pen and paper, meticulously sketching, writing, and planning in a journal. It was a powerful and humbling sight. The foundation of great coaching was a commitment to preparation and a passion for player development. This simple observation sparked a question. What if we could give every coach, from a passionate parent at the recreational level to the club coaching director, access to the same level of structured, thoughtful planning? Zone 14 Coaching is the answer.

SPEAKER_09 8:45

Visit Zone14Coin.com and use the promo code GP20 for 20% off.

SPEAKER_10 8:51

And if you want to outfit your entire organization or even just one team, contact Zone 14Coing at Zone14Coaching.com for bulk pricing. Zone 14 Coaching for high-level soccer knowledge and structured planning is accessible and simple.

SPEAKER_11 9:08

The United Goalkeeping Alliance is the world's number one virtual educational platform for goalkeepers. The UGKA emphasizes a goalkeeper culture while supporting goalkeepers around the world through every stage of their development. United Goalkeeping Alliance is an ever-growing network of goalkeeper coaches with agreed-upon goals of educating generations of goalkeepers around the five elements of a goalkeeper's development: tactical development, technical knowledge, physical growth, psychological balance, and social connections. If you'd like to learn more about our memberships for goalkeepers, for goalkeeper coaches, and for clubs, please reach out anytime at 781-424-3028. Or you can email us at info at United GKAliance.com.

SPEAKER_10 9:56

This is JP Della Camera from Fox Sports, and you're listening to the GP Soccer Podcast with host Giovanni Piccini.

SPEAKER_09 10:38

And welcome to the GP Soccer Podcast Conversation with the Coach. And as you all know, if you're a regular listener to my show, that that always changes. And today the case is a conversation with a sport and performance psychologist, and arguably one of the finest in the world. And who am I talking about? Well, I'm talking about Dan Abrahams, of course. Dan is a former professional golfer and has spent the last 20 years working with some of the best sports competitors in the world. He has been a consultant psychologist for Aston Martin F1, has been the lead psychologist for England golf and for England rugby. He has held contracts with six premier level football teams as well and in the United States. He has worked with professional teams all across the country and is currently the consultant psychologist to Angel City, the world's most valuable women's soccer team. He is the author of four previous best-selling books, including Soccer Tough, a book, by the way, that Gareth Baile said changed his life. His podcast, The Sports Psycho Sports Psych Show, is one of the leading sports psychology podcasts globally. And his latest work, Timing is Wonderful here, is a book that is entitled Compete: Developing a Mental Playbook for Performance Under Pressure in Sport. Dan Abrahams, welcome back to the GP Soccer Podcast.

SPEAKER_05 12:03

It's been too long. Thank you so much for the invite to come back on. Absolutely delighted to be here, sir.

SPEAKER_09 12:08

It's always a pleasure. So let me ask you, are you still swinging the golf club? Are you hitting them straight?

SPEAKER_05 12:13

Oh man, that's that's that's a podcast in and of itself. Um I I haven't played for about a decade. I think I need to see a sports psychologist if you know of any good ones. Uh no, I haven't played for years. Not because I'm just so busy. But but also on a serious note here, I mean, one of the reasons why I'm a sports psychologist uh wasn't just to work out where I went wrong uh from a psychological perspective because it was a weakness to my game, but um also because I'd burnt out completely, J. And I've got no, I love golf, I love working in golf, uh, I love working as a sports psychologist, two golfers. Um, but I don't necessarily have the inclination to pick up the golf clubs again. So uh that's the long answer to your question, a short answer to your question. Other than doing uh swings without a club in my kitchen whilst waiting for food to to be prepared or um or you know, whatever, then um, yeah, other than that, I've really not played golf at all.

SPEAKER_09 13:05

Well, I'll tell you, um, and you can attest to this being having been a professional, it is arguably one of the most, if not the most, difficult sports to play. When you stop and think um that you've got to hit this tiny ball over an enormous uh amount of geography to get into this little hole at the other end of the universe, it's extraordinarily difficult. I I played for a mere, I don't know, four or five years and played, I put that in quotes, Dan. Um I finally I finally gave it up. Uh I didn't play consistently enough. Soccer always kind of got in the way, and then I said to myself, you know what, what are you doing? What are you doing? And I retired the golf clubs. But I still on occasion will put on the golf channel and watch the greats work because it is absolutely amazing uh as to what they can do with the golf club, you know.

SPEAKER_05 13:53

Yeah, I know it is it's a tough game, and it's you know, as you say, it's a stationary ball, it's a small ball, it's a stationary ball, and you know, there's a lot of time to think, and that's why so many people perceive it as such a you're out there on your own. You've got no excuses, nobody else to fall back on, and and those kind of factors are why people will say, Look, this is a really, really tough game psychologically. So, you know, just a couple of millimeters left or right, uh, as in the club face pointing left or right by a couple of millimetres, can send the ball can send the balls miles left or right. So it is a tough sport. Uh, I certainly made it look tougher, that's for sure, in my playing days. Um, but look, all good fun.

SPEAKER_09 14:30

Well, let's talk about another ball. We'll talk about a soccer ball. We'll sh we'll shift gears here. Uh, that's a nice segue. When I was putting together this season of the GP Soccer podcast, I knew there would be a uh an obvious World Cup twist to the show for all the obvious reasons. As they re as we record this, we're a mere 30 or 31 days away from the opening of uh of the World Cup. And I knew that pressure was something that I wanted to talk about, and uh I thought of no one better than you to uh to talk about that. So the timing of your book here that uh we kind of joked about earlier before I hit the record button is is absolutely absolutely spot on. Um so I'm I'm curious as to kind of get the ball rolling, so to speak. Um the origins of all this, were there were there problems um or what problems did were you seeing most often in athletes under pressure that made you um you know feel like a new mental playbook approach was needed?

SPEAKER_05 15:20

Yeah, absolutely. Well, I I I I wanted to bring all my work together and and uh you know I I I'd had my my last book I wrote back in 2015, and I'd written four books in four years, and uh really after that it was time to go away, and uh I was building experiences at that time, working with great coaches, teams, individual players, and so on and so forth, organizations, and and and I I I uh I had written these books and I was like, I'm gonna continue to to build up these experiences, and uh really I got to a couple of years ago and I was like, I'm ready, I'm ready to to write my next book and and bringing in all the terms that I write about on social media every single day, bringing everything together. Um and and that's what really um go has gone into this new book. Uh it's a book called Compete, and as you've kind of alluded to there, the subtitle is Developing a Mental Playbook for Performance Under Pressure in Sport. And you know, pressure is synonymous with sport, high performance sport. I mean, maybe it shouldn't be if you know you're dealing with eight, nine, ten-year-olds, but when we start talking about the World Cup and I'm going to be supporting England, and I'm assuming you're going to be supporting the US, um uh, you know, we want our teams to perform under pressure. Um, and and it it it it this is an interesting opening to our conversation, Gio, because this is very much how I uh open up the book. Uh I talk about the importance of control. I mean, that's the first word I'm really leaning into in the book. I want players to be able to have the capacity to take control and take charge of themselves when they go and compete under pressure or to take control, uh, to find their high performance mindset uh under pressure, and that means taking control and taking charge, in order to win more moments on the pitch. There are thousands of mini moments that emerge uh and dissolve uh all around us when we're playing, when we're competing, um, in order to then better manage momentum. And again, in the introduction to this book, I'm talking about soccer being is the game of control. As coaches, you want to take control of the game. So you're working on tactics from that perspective. I'm saying I want players and teams to be able to take control of themselves in order to better take control of the game. How? Find your high performance mindset, win more moments, manage momentum. Soccer is a game of moments, uh mindset, moment, and momentum. One last thing to say here before I throw it back to you. What I also talk about in that chapter is I talk about uh performance under pressure from the perspective of it's highly likely that players under pressure are going to have more thoughts, emotions, feelings that could be considered negative. And I have a term for this, and I'm sure last time I was on your podcast, I used this term as well. I call them ants, the A for automatic, the N for negative, the T for thoughts, automatic negative thoughts, automatic negative thoughts. When players under pressure have ants, automatic negative thoughts and emotions and feelings. Why do they have ants under pressure? And again, we can think about the English team going into the World Cup, we can think about the US team going into the World Cup. Two main reasons, actually, GR. There's two reasons that I posit in this introduction to the book as to why players tend to have ants under pressure, and that's because of high importance and high uncertainty. High importance and high uncertainty. High importance is important this is important to us. When something is important to you, your brain and nervous system can skew towards negative because it's kind of saying to you, watch out, be careful. Okay, don't make a mistake, don't mess up. It's gonna be a big deal if you make a mistake. You're gonna be a bit embarrassed. People might think you're rubbish. So there's that high importance element to it. Okay, gotta play well, gotta play well, gotta play well, don't make a mistake, don't make a mistake, don't make a mistake. High importance, plus high uncertainty. I don't know if I'm gonna play well. I don't know how my teammates are gonna play. I don't know how the opposition are gonna play. I don't know what the final score is gonna be. Are we gonna qualify? Are we gonna progress in the tournament? I don't know. High importance, high importance, high uncertainty tends to increase the number of ants, automatic negative thought promotion feelings, and the volume of ants. And this is what we're going to see this summer in the World Cup. We are potentially going to see a US team, an English team riddled with ants. Those players have to be able to squash their ants in order to be able to compete to their uh the to the best of their ability as individuals and as teammates. That's absolutely critical.

SPEAKER_09 20:20

In your answer there, you mentioned uh the word control and the importance of control. Was there prior to your your starting the book, um, was there something specific in terms of control that you were noticing players having an inability to to deal with? Was it something very specific, or was it just a a general view that you had, like, my goodness, they're not handling this well, I noticed they're not handling that well, they could do better there, and then boy, if they had a better control, maybe they could. What was the genesis of of that when you talk about the word control?

SPEAKER_05 20:50

Yeah, I I that's a really great question, and and and I I start there because I think there's two interesting things at play here. Because uh and and I can only speak for myself and my experience. I've 30 years in high performance sport, 20 years as a sports psychologist. So there's people who are more experienced than me, people who are less experienced than me. But in my experience, when players go into a competitive game, a competitive meeting, a competitive event, whatever sport we're we're talking about there, it's very rarely rare for a player to say, right, I'm competing on Saturday. Big game, right, I'm gonna take control and take charge of myself out there. What they tend to do, the narrative, the relationship with competition and tournament players that tends to be gotta win, gotta win, gotta win, gotta perform, gotta perform, gotta perform. It'd be disaster if I don't perform. What if I mess up? What if I come out of the team? It'll be and so on and so forth. So as human beings, we have a narrative in our mind all the time. We have inner stories about the world around us, about our life, about how we're experiencing our soccer, for example. Or how we are interpreting this competitive game. We have a narrative, we create meaning. And too often, and I've been blessed to work with some of the very best players in the world, being based here in England, in Europe, but also out in America as well, and get to work with some amazing players. And if you sit down with them and you ask them what they're trying to achieve mentally when they go and compete, very rarely are they able to articulate a precise framework. So really the genesis of this book is very much look, I think players need to have mental frameworks that help them to take control and take charge. I mean, we can go deeper into what those mental frameworks can look like as we talk about the skills and the techniques in this book, but very rarely, and as I say, I want to lean on this experience that I've had. I've worked at six Premier League clubs here in England, um, MLS clubs and WSL clubs, very rarely, if I sit down with a player, are they able to articulate what this framework looks like for them? So there's that element there. So then really what I'm saying in this book is like this is a book that's gonna help you create that mental framework. If your coach listening in, if you want your players to be able to establish, and you want to help those players establish that mental framework, this can be quite a powerful book for you that then enables them to win more moments, that then enables them to help their team manage momentum and to high perform. The other side of this, and I just draw back on the ants, the automatic negative thoughts, emotions, feelings. So I bolt on emotions and feelings. There's eight billion people on planet Earth, and without making this sound too much like school, okay, there's eight billion people on planet earth, and there's something that all eight billion of us have in common, and that is this that we all when you strip psychology back and you make it super simple, we all have thoughts, emotions, feelings. Okay, psychology is essentially the thoughts, emotions, and feelings that you're experiencing. Yes, it's more complicated than complex than that, but let's make this super simple. So when you think about the players that you're coaching, they're all having thoughts, emotions, feelings. They don't do those thoughts, emotions, feelings on purpose. Those thoughts, emotions, feelings happen to them. And yes, you can generate a thought, and yes, you can probably generate a feeling over time, but again, let's simplify it. When your players compete, they all have thoughts, emotions, feelings. And as I've said earlier, high importance, high uncertainty tends to skew those thoughts, emotions, feelings in the direction of neg negativity, negative or unhelpful thoughts, emotions, feelings. So players tend to have ads. Now, here and thank you for being patient with me here. Here is the dynamic that I was I'm also leaning into in the book. And and and that's that human beings can't control, use that word control, can't control their thoughts, emotions, feelings. Their thoughts, emotions, feelings happen to them. The players' thoughts, emotions, feelings happen to them. And under pressure, they're having those ants. But what I say in the book, and a big reason behind this word control and the techniques and the skills in the book, is that players can take control of their response to their thoughts, emotions, and feelings. The American players in the summer will be having ants, automatic negative thoughts, emotions, feelings. They can't help that. That's okay. And some ants can be useful. It's a sign of readiness to play, to compete. But what we don't want is an overwhelm of negative thoughts, emotions, feelings. Players can't help but have thoughts, emotions, feelings. You can't control the existence of ants, but you can control your response to your ants. I can control my response to the thoughts, emotions, feelings I'm having at any given time. And there's a bunch of skills and techniques and approaches in the book that help people to can take control, to take control of their response to their thoughts, emotions, feelings. So you know, those two aspects here are real drivers of why I've written the book, what is in the book, and how I've written the book.

SPEAKER_09 26:27

You've got me going a mile a minute. You really do. Uh you really do. Um I'm gonna stay in this for butt for a bowl. I'm actually deviating from my my script here. Um controlling thoughts, emotions, and feelings of say a Leonel Messi, you know, the arguably the greatest player in the world, versus uh an average player. You know, someone who might play for a a you know, uh a terrific club, a high-level club. They may even start for that matter, but they're not Lionel Messi. What in your research, what what are your what have you found that uh a Leonel Messi may be able to deal with, or even battle, if you will, when it comes to controlling his thoughts, emotions, and feelings versus a player B. Do you follow what I'm saying?

SPEAKER_05 27:10

A hundred percent. And and I and I really want to clarify here that what my my central hypothesis in the book is that you can take control of your response to your thoughts, emotions, feelings. So thoughts, emotions, feelings are emerging all the time, you know, some which are helpful, some which are unhelpful, some which are easy to ignore, others that are loud and less easy to ignore. So uh it's that response, it's like that stimulus response. And people talk about stimulus response to what's happening external to them. I talk about a lot of it stimulus response being the stimulus is the thought, emotion, feeling you're having now. I can respond to that. But let's dig into the answer you're looking for here. You're dealing with a Lionel Messi type player, and I haven't uh had the privilege of working with Lionel Messi, but I've certainly had the privilege of working with world-class players who have played at World Cups, who've played in Champions League finals, um, who've played uh uh uh under serious pressure. And what I can safely say, and this is as a sports psychologist, because I'm so you know, I've been a golf coach, I've been a professional golfer, I have a good, strong, holistic uh background, and I'm into coaching science and skill acquisition. It would be ludicrous uh of me to suggest that there's not some players who have so much skill in their feet, or if we think of another sport like golf, so much skill in their hands that they don't get away, you know, with uh with with ants, if you like, automatic negative thoughts, emotional feelings. There's definitely players out there who can experience quite a lot of ants but are just so skillful, so good at what they do. So, for example, cognitively uh uh on the cognitive perceptual side of things, the the awareness around them uh of what's going on around them side of things, they're so good there that they get away with poor thinking. That that and they don't necessarily have to respond too much to their their ants, their automatic negative thoughts, emotions, feelings that exist. That's fine, that's okay. But you know, the the the soccer is a team game, and um uh the reality is that whether you're Lionel Messi or your average player, you have to be able to be a great teammate as well, and that means you've got to execute the responsibilities in your role, you know. That means you you've got to be the best possible individual and teammate you can be, and to be able to do that, you know, you know, for me, you have to be uh as optimal as you can be at any given moment. So um there are definitely some players in a squad of 25 or a squad of 18 that I can say, this person's really, really good at this. I don't have to worry too much about this person. That's okay, that's fine, we're gonna put them to the side. They know they they can find their high performance mindset easily, or they've got so much skill in their feet, they just get on with it, no problem. I might also want them to be able to lead better. I want might also want them to be better teammates. Is Lionel Messi a great leader? Maybe he is. Is he a great teammate? Maybe he is, just by the way that he plays. But ultimately, it's a team game. We need we need great individual, great teammates, great leaders who are going to go out there and execute as part of a team. So as long as as long as um uh you know your Lionel Messies and your your great players are able to be a great part of a team, a high functioning part of that team. That's the most important thing there.

SPEAKER_09 30:44

So when you talk about mental framework, what are what are some of the essential components that every player should uh even write down and practice? Are there exercises that that you you you would give to an athlete in order to um to achieve the goals that he or she may be uh trying to achieve?

SPEAKER_05 31:03

Yeah, absolutely. I mean the uh d again just leaning into the book, uh uh and if somebody calls me in to do some consultancy work with them, they would get a very similar answer. Um, in as much as um I am very into uh players being able to find their what I call high performance mindset. I I I think it if people listening in, um, and and this is very much chapter one in the book, uh, can envision a performance scale from one to ten and a mindset scale from one to ten. We're very much entrenched in that uh performance scale. You know, gotta perform, gotta perform, gotta perform, as I said earlier. Uh, we want to be high on that performance scale. We want to have nine out of ten games, eight out of ten games. We don't really want to drop below five. I'm the person who comes along and says, hey, let's there's a mindset scale going on every single second out there. Let's know what you've got to do to be as high as possible on that mindset scale, your high performance mindset. And I break that down in that first chapter. But a big part of your question here is kind of like, well, what do you mean by mindset? What kind of things do you want to explore and discover and strive to work on and get better? And what kind of things can we write down in our mental playbook? And I I I make a uh I made a bold decision in my book. I say bold, I mean uh hopefully that that that doesn't sound over the top, but um I I made a bold decision to make the claim, and I will still make this claim now, that when we think about mindset or the mental uh aspect of soccer, performing in soccer, competing in soccer, I think there are three skills that are happening every single second out there, Gio. And as a goalkeeping coach, I'm sure you'll appreciate these three skills. Um, they're happening every single second. And I think my my bold statement in the book and in general is that I think all psychological concepts and constructs can be loaded onto these three skills. For me, they're first principles essentially. So, again, as you listen in, Geo, you might think about this as your with your goalkeeping lens on. And all coaches might consider their coaching practice. Three skills attention, intensity, intent.

SPEAKER_10 33:34

Attention, intensity, and intent.

SPEAKER_05 33:38

Attention, a focus of attention. Players being focused and connected to the game in their high performance mindset. When they're in their high performance mindset, they're HPM, they're focused and connected to the game. You ask, you think about players writing stuff down, what does that look like? What does that feel like? If I was working with one of your goalkeepers, Gio, we were working together, I'd be saying, what does a focus of attention look like to you? What does it feel like? What will others see? What does Geo want you to be focused and paying attention to, connected to the game? Probably connected to space, ball, teammates, opposition, connected to responsibilities, um, connected to the action-based cues related to positioning, handling, footwork, etc. etc. If we're talking about goalkeeping here. So that first mental skill of attention is possibly your most important, your most important currency in all of soccer. It's arguably the most important mental skill. A close cousin to attention, Geo, is that second skill of intensity now? When I talk about intensity, I'm talking about a mental intensity. I'm talking about strength of engagement, hence why it's a close cousin to attention. And strength of engagement, in a high performance mindset, you'll have a strong level of engagement where you're alert and ready. Alert and ready, alert and ready, alertness and readiness. So you're alert to the opportunities and ready to exploit them. So as a goalkeeper, I'm alert to the run a teammate has made, and I'm going to exploit that by being ready to distribute the ball to them. I'm alert to the dangers and ready to deal with them. I'm alert to my responsibilities and ready to execute them. Mental intensity is alertness and readiness. Attention is being focused and connected to the game. And then that final uh mental skill is the mental skill of intent. Now that sounds very different. I don't think we talk enough about this in soccer and in sports psychology. What is intent? What do I mean by that? Intent is a mind-body state, a mind-body state that is constantly influencing the style in which it we execute our actions. We're either executing our actions with energy forward, and that's our high performance mindset, or with energy back, and that's our low performance mindset. When we're energy forward, we're executing our actions purposefully, positively, proactively. Think of your goalkeepers being energy forward. They're purposeful. Maybe organizing the defense at a uh on a corner kick. Um, they're executing their actions positively, coming for that catch with conviction, for example. They're executing their actions and they're displaying uh a purposeful or excuse me, a proactive attitude. So again, organization, proactive in and around that penalty area, again, if we're talking about goalkeepers. Whereas in a low performance mindset, that's where your energy back and you're hesitant, inhibited, and passive. So just uh a summary here attention intensity intent are three mental skills that are constantly, Gio, constantly influencing performance, quality of performance, quality of action execution. Every single second players are cycling through attention intensity intent, attention intensity, intent. So the book is about can I as an ambitious competitor compete with a high level of int uh of attention, an optimal level of intensity, a high level of intent to have a high performance, attention, intensity, intent, and then it offers a whole raft of mental techniques that help you to do just that. Attention, intensity, intent.

SPEAKER_09 38:03

All of which is fueled by, and please correct me if I'm wrong, all of which is fueled by the player's ability to scan, to pick up cues in a game that is fast and oftentimes chaotic. Um talk to my audience about that element, the ability to to to you know take those elements you just talked about, um and and and shape it into your ability to scan and picking up cues, and again, in in terms of in terms of chaos.

SPEAKER_05 38:32

I love that question. And and and so in chapter three of the book, I I introduced the first mental technique that loads onto attention, intensity, and tension. And you very much talk about the skill of attention there. I want to be focused and connected to the game throughout that you know, unstructured, chaotic environment, right? And so in chapter three, I talk about players having a focus flashlight, almost like a flashlight that directs your attention outwards onto the cues that are emerging and dissolving, appearing and disappearing as the game goes on around you. What we can pretty much safely say from an attentional standpoint is that soccer, like most team sports, is a game that demands or requires largely an external focus of attention. That isn't to suggest that sometimes we don't want to come have an internal focus of attention when we focus our attention inwards, for example, and we can talk about mini examples of when that might when you might want that. But by and large, because soccer is a team game where you're trying to pick up the cues that inform your best next decision, that inform the best next action, technical, tactical, physical action, you want to be able to detect those cues. So we want that flashlight pointing outwards. We want to constantly scan and search, scan and search, scan and search those cues that indicate our best next decision and our best next action. So we want to have that external focus of attention, and this is where we can bring back the ants, the automatic negative thoughts, emotions, feelings. You see, ants are powerful. When I have an automatic negative thought, emotion, feeling or uh an infestation of ants, an ant farm in my head, if you like. I'm not doing well. Wow, this opposition is really good. I can't believe I made that mistake. Oh, this is going to be tough today. I might get subbed off. Those kind of ants, what tends to happen is my attention turns inwards onto the ant or the ants, onto the automatic negative thoughts, emotions, feelings, feelings of anxiety, feelings maybe of frustration, maybe of despondency, uh, maybe of you know anxiety. All these kind of thoughts, emotions, feelings that are emerging, we start to focus on those, and then we start to miss the cues and the clues going on around us in the game. A great competitor, Geo, a great competitor is someone who constantly keeps that external focus of attention as a general rule to be able to by scanning and searching, scanning and searching, to be able to continue to make good decisions and continue to execute action after action after action after action in a high performance mindset. That is absolutely critical. And so our capacity, let's come back to the ants again, our capacity to take control, to take charge of our response to the ants that we experience is critical. We need to keep being a great detective out there. And as a goalkeeping coach there, and you must you want your goalkeepers to be great detectives.

SPEAKER_09 41:47

Indeed. Um, I don't know if this is related, Dan. Um you talked about the focus flashlight. Oftentimes we hear, particularly with high-level athletes, I can think of Michael Jordan um comes to mind right off the bat. How oftentimes when they were playing, they said that the game was as they played was in slow motion, and they were able to see things, and I put C in quotes, that maybe the any other athlete was unable to see, which allowed them to make decisions earlier, uh subsequently allowed them maybe make a pass or take a shot that they would not normally take, if you know, if they didn't see things in s in slow motion. How much did that element have to do with what we're talking about here? The ability to see the game or situation in slow motion and yet still be able to perform um you know at at a high level.

SPEAKER_05 42:37

Yeah, I I I I think that I mean when people talk about seeing the game in slow motion, obviously a lot of people listening in will start thinking about the flow state. Um Mihai Chik sent Mihai, uh the uh famous researcher who who coined the term flow. I don't use that term in the book. Uh I I have that mindset scale state where you're seeing the game is is very much up there at 9 out of 10. Or when somebody says, Yeah, man, I was 10 out of 10. 10 out of 10 or 9 out of 10 for that for that game from a mindset perspective, not necessarily a performance perspective, but and not a mindset perspective, you know, often they're in that flow state, and that's where they're seeing everything slows down around them, and they feel like they've got all the time in the world. And that that that's a that's a complex combination of factors, but that's definitely where I'm trying to, in the book, you know, help people create a mental playbook in order to give them a better chance to find that. You're not gonna find it all the time, you know, it's that effortless state. And and I think as human beings trying to be the best that we can be, sometimes we have to play in an effortful state where things we've got to fight a little bit and it it things don't slow down, and we've got to deal with the challenges that are thrown at us, and we've got to talk to ourselves a little bit and remind ourselves to have great body language and stay in our game face, which is another technique I talk about in the book, uh, and squash our Deliberately, but sometimes we just turn up and we hit that nine or nine out of ten on mindset, and we're in that flow state, and everything's great. I think there's a combination of factors when we talk about people like Michael Jordan, we're talking about somebody who was athletically gifted, worked every hour, God sends. Um very intelligent, a leader, just had all of the jigsaw puzzle filled in. So possibly, you know, his high performance mindset or HPM for short was just a higher version of everybody else's HPM. You know, I I I think there is a uh it's multivariate, right? It's multi-dimensionally underpinned. But certainly in this book, I'm inviting people to strive to become a student of this, Geo. Be a student of your mindset, not just a student of the game, but a student of your mindset in order to invite in more of the days, the games that you're speaking to there, where things do slow down, you feel stronger, you feel sharper, you feel faster. That to me requires good frameworks to underpin your competitive performances.

SPEAKER_09 45:09

You talk about in the book about uh a match script, uh basically a focus plan that contributes to your HPM um in breaking down your game. Elaborate on that, this idea of establishing a match script.

SPEAKER_05 45:23

Yeah, look, I follow a focus flashlight with this idea of match script, and and essentially what I'm saying here is look, a match script is is um your top call it two or three actions, tasks, responsibilities related to technical, tactical, physical actions, and mindset as well, that you know you've got to go out there and execute. You've got lots of responsibilities on the pitch, you've got lots of actions to execute, you've got lots of tasks that you need to accomplish. What are the top two or three? What are the main two or three? And you can have more, but sort of around three might be where our mental workspace, what our mental workspace can can accommodate. But what it's saying is look, if you've got a game on Saturday, why don't you sit down on Thursday? And why don't you, and you can do this with a coach, or if you're coach listening and you can do this with your players, the top two or three things that and the science here very much leans towards three elements of creating a match script, creating these actions or tasks, and they that's that they want to be as specific as possible, as controllable as possible, and framed positively. So I'm gonna, you know, I'm using you a bit today, uh Gio, as a goalkeeper coach. Let's come back to a goalkeeper. What I don't want necessarily want is a goalkeeper having a match script revolve around keeping a clean sheet, um uh making every save, uh catching every cross. Um those aren't very specific. They're not particularly controllable, those although there's aspects of controllability about them, they're certainly framed in the positive. So don't concede would be one framed in the negative. What would be more specific might be um uh strong strong uh uh strong leak to catch my crosses, and you've forgotten more about this stuff than I'll ever know, Gio. So please excuse me here for my vague ideas, but um um get my positioning spot on uh in my 1v1s, uh be aggressive. Things that are as specific as possible, as controllable as positive, and framed positively. And what you can then do again, let's come back to I'm sitting down, I'm writing this on a Thursday. These are essentially focus cues that you can use for mental rehearsal, so they aid your mental rehearsal going in there. You can take them into the changing with room with you, so they're right there. They focus your attention on the key aspects of the game. You can write them down. I think as a goalkeeper, you could probably write them down on a band just at the bottom of your glove. Um, you can take them out onto the pitch with you as in try to recall them, that is possible, and some players can do that. Other players say to me, Dan, I don't try to recall them on the pitch, I just have them as part of my preparation. But they are attentional cues that very much meet this idea of occasionally you can just allow your focus of attention to turn inwards, remind yourself of what your main tasks are, just to keep yourself on the straight and narrow during a game, especially if you're engulfed in a bunch of ants, and and and that can help you squash the ants and come back to what's important now, essentially. So the match script kind of fulfills this idea of to take control and take charge. Sometimes I'm just going to check in with myself, remind myself what I need to do, and then I go again, and maybe then I have that external focus of attention sometimes. So focus, flashlight, and match script are two prime mental techniques that helps me play with a great deal of attentional skill that loads onto a great performance.

SPEAKER_09 49:04

What you refer to as match script when I was working with goalkeepers or do work with goalkeepers, um, I talk about game outcome. You know, uh usually the day before the match, where the starting goalkeeper happens to me. I'm like, what's the game outcome for tomorrow? And and I would always preface my comment or the question by saying, I'm not talking about the score. What is the game outcome? And I would leave it at that and then get from them what they're looking to accomplish. And as you noted earlier, it could be just, you know, I want to be able to pull down crosses, I want to be able to, you know, uh manage the box better on a corner kick. I want my distribution to be, you know, appropriate. Do I pull, do I punch, or do I, you know, whatever. Um, and I found, uh, as amateurish as this may be compared to what we're talking about with you, uh it it gave the goalkeeper a broader view of what he should be doing in a match, minus the score. And in doing so, you minus the score, you take away that pressure of the scoreboard. And the scoreboard is the greatest thing in the world, and it's the worst thing in the world, particularly if you're a goalkeeper, as we all know, um mistakes that goalkeepers make are showing up on the on the scoreboard. What are your thoughts about that? Um, you know, again, you use MatchScript, I use I use game outcomes. Um let's focus on a goalkeepers since we're so we're on that track.

SPEAKER_05 50:22

That that that's precisely it. You know, it's helping you squash the ants, and that the the the arguably the biggest uh um contributor to an overwhelm of ants is exactly what you said outcome and performance, outcome and performance. I mean, people can't believe you know behind the scenes again. I I I I lean on and please excuse me for saying this, but blessed to work with some pretty amazing players. But you know, when players get distracted and disconnected, if we think the of the converse of a high performance mindset, it's a low performance mindset, which is at the bottom of the mindset scale. Um in a high performance mindset, we're focused and connected to the game. In a low performance mindset, we're distracted and disconnected from the game, and the biggest uh culprits of creating distraction and disconnection is outcome and performance. It's being overly concerned about outcome and it's often trying to force performance too much, or it's being overly worried about performance too much. You know, so many of our anxieties, so many of our anxious ants, as I would call them, are based on sociality. They're social anxiety, social anxious ants. You know, what will people think of me? I'll be embarrassed if I make a mistake. These things are probably implicit as much as they are explicit, they're just part of what it is to be a human being in an achievement setting. And so so much of the theoretical underpinning here is based on achievement goal setting, you know, achievement planning. How do I plan to maneuver myself through this uh achievement moment? Well, okay, you know what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna uh um worry less about outcome. I can't control that. I know I want to win, I know I want to be in a winning team, so let's relax about that though, because then it's about performance. Well, you know what? I can't force performance, and the more I try to force performance, the more I'm gonna invite in ants, automatic negative thoughts, emotions, feelings. So I really need to place myself on that mindset scale. I need to execute with my focus flashlight in mind, or maybe my match script, or maybe my game face, or using controllers, which is another technique in the book. I want players to have a rich mental playbook. And when I say rich mental playbook, there might just be one or two ideas or approaches or techniques, right the way through to players who like a few more, three or four or five. That's okay, everybody's a little bit different, but ultimately it is to reduce stress, to squash those anxious ants or frustrated ants or angry ants or despondent ants, whatever may afflict you under pressure. You have to come back to these mini tools and techniques. Now, being an experienced coach geo, and I know many experienced coaches will be listening in, you will be doing this in your own way over the years. You've found your own pathway through, you know, and and and this book can offer uh a few more ideas or back up what you're doing already, but ultimately what I'm also saying here is I'm creating this framework of this loads onto this mindset scale, you know. Let's have let's help players be passionate about this mindset scale when they go out and they compete. And that to me is absolutely critical because ultimately that turns down the volume of pressure of anxious ants um in a really effective way. Helps them stay focused and connected to the game, find optimal engagement, optimal intensity, and compete with a high level of intent out there.

SPEAKER_09 54:09

Essentially, what you've provided them, Dan, is a toolkit that's when they're facing various levels of performance, they know where what what tool do I pull out of the toolkit to help me deal with that. Particularly, you know, if if you if if an athlete that's slipping into a a low performance mindset, you know, he or she is going to you know really need that that toolkit to get them out of a situation that will allow them to play at an appropriate level. Is that is that a safe thing to say?

SPEAKER_05 54:34

Oh, 100%. And that toolkit can can can be one tool in your toolbox, it could be three or four tools in your toolbox, you know, and and and and and and broadened, it's also if you want to be a great leader and a great teammate, you might want to have some tools whereby you can help others on your team if they drop down to their LPM, their low performance mindset, you know, and you work at the very highest level of level of the game. Okay, and I still don't think we're good enough at doing that yet. I think there's, you know, so I can certainly say in the Premier League, there's not enough good leadership, there's not enough good teamwork, you know, aside from you know the tactical work that goes on. So, you know, these tools and in and the toolbox can be broad and deep, you know, and and and so um I I think that's a critical thing for um clubs, teams to to consider.

SPEAKER_09 55:26

Before we shift gears into discussing the World Cup, because as I note, as we speak, it's about 30 days away. Um let's talk about a team culture. What what can what can coaches do to make mental skills a normal part of training, if you will, instead of it being something that players only think about when they're struggling?

SPEAKER_05 55:44

You've got it's such a great question. And again, look, I'm biased on IGO. I think this is a this is a book that everybody can pick up, but it it it really is because what I urge people to do is take this out into the grass. You know, I I I I'm you've mentioned when players, you know, drop down to LPM. This this is uh let's go back to Michael Jordan. This is a player, this is a th these are techniques to help players find 9 out of 10 or 10 out of 10 HPM high performance mindset on that mindset scale more often. And and their tools and techniques that that that can help players climb up from LPM to HPM, low performance mindset to to to high performance mindset, and the best way to do both things is to take these out onto the grass with you. And you can do this with all ages, you can do this with eight, nine, ten-year-olds, you can do this with players who are worth £50 million or $15 million in transfer value. You really, really can, you know, players who are eight, nine can create uh game faces and squash ants and have a match script, even if it's just one play in the match script. Players who are 25 years old and are going to play in the World Cup can squash ants and be in game face and and and um you know use all of the techniques in the book. That's critical, but you've got to take them out on the grass. And if you're interested in creating a team and and um you know using my own playbook as an example here in in my own consultancy practice, I worked with uh Arna Slot, who's now you know the Liverpool head coach. I worked with him at Fire Nord in the Dutch era Divisi Championship, and we brought in the mindset scale, and we brought in the language of HPM and LPM, particularly emphasizing and reinforcing HPM. So we started to work on teamwork from the perspective of just having shared language there. What do we do here? We do HPM Geo when we go and compete, when we go and play Ajax away from home in Amsterdam, we compete in our HPM, and that was the first year we beat them uh away from home for 17 years. When we go play PSV, we do so in our HPM. We don't care who we play, where we play, or when we play, we do so in HPM, high performance mindset. And then you can have every single player speaking the language of HPM and knowing precisely what they have to do to find their own unique high performance mindset, and then you take that language out into the grass with you. I want rondos, keep balls, small sidey games, not just for the purpose of technical, tactical, physical developments and performance, but also to be able to squash ants, automatic negative thoughts. Let's do a rondo and squash our ants, let's do a keek ball and squash our ants, let's do a rondo and do it in game face, let's do a keek ball in game face, let's practice self-talk. I call it a self-talk controller in the book. Let's practice our self-talk in this small-sided game. You can take these techniques out onto the pitch and th out onto the pitch, out onto the grass in practice, in training. And that is where good psychology is done, Geo. It's done in training and practice. It's not done in a room down the corridor, two doors on your left, where nobody else can see because we're all a bit embarrassed about it, you know, and look, and that's not to suggest that well-being and mental health, you know, doesn't play a part in this, and and maybe that's a little bit more siloed, maybe some of it, but performance psychology needs to be done on the grass. And the most powerful psychologists in many respects are players themselves. Can we upskill them to drive their own psychology and help their teammates on the psychological aspects? And then the second most powerful psychologist, although, you know, I'm not saying players and coaches are psychologists per se, but the second most powerful are coaches. You need to be doing this, and you're doing this anyway, but can you be even better at delivering on this, doing this on the grass? So it's all about taking these ideas, taking them on the grass, and making it a main feature of your session design, making it a main feature of your coach reinforcement, your coach feedback, your coach behaviors, making it a main thing that you're getting players talking about in their huddle. They're driving squashing ads, they're driving game face, they're driving scripts, they're talking about self-talk, they're using their body language, they're optimizing their leadership and their teamwork around this. This is absolutely critical.

SPEAKER_09 1:00:29

And you hit it right on the head. This is initiated by the coach. Um I remember I'm no longer a head coach, a goalkeeper coach at the college level, but I was a head coach clearly for a long, long time. And you know, leading up to the day of a match, um, I I didn't know of the term, you know, high performance, but I I was practicing it, the players could discernibly see that my my presence, and that was the key word, my presence had changed. All of a sudden I was a little bit more demand. I wasn't a jerk. This is this is I think this is key to say. You know, I wasn't being an idiot jerk or you know, mean, so to speak, but my presence was far more in effect a couple of days before a match. Any match, not because we're playing for a conference championship, we're playing like you know the number two team in the region, any match. And then the players would feed off that. Whatever activities we were doing, whatever drills, whatever small set of games, there was an another element of intensity, another element of focus that was driven by yours truly. And I always made it a point, and I always think I think this is super important. I would love to get your feedback on this. I would tell them why. Because I wouldn't set it up by saying, hey guys, you know, I'm gonna be a little bit intense today, maybe a little bit more uh up be a little bit, you know, a little bit more fired up. So uh I wouldn't set the table. I would just come out and have that presence uh on the field, and then at the very end, gentlemen, why? And I would let them tell me. Uh I found that to be very, very important and appropriate that the the players knew why that demeanor, that mindset was present on the field, um, you know, driven by yours truly. What are your what are your thoughts on all that?

SPEAKER_05 1:01:59

Yeah, it it it may it reminds me of something I I'm saying, you know, with the organizations, with the teams I'm working with in the moment, and that's the equation coach-led, player-driven, system supported. It's so you you're quite right. It's still, and and people have to give them themselves coaches have to give themselves permission to be coach-led from the perspective we talk a lot about you know having player-driven cultures, which is critical, which is vital, but it's okay to be coach-led. It's okay for you to you know lead on this with your approach, your behaviors, your body language, your style, your session designs. That's all coach-led, and that's fine. And then there's nothing wrong, you know. As a coach, you you have an expertise, use that expertise, you know, you're setting a tone. Set that tone. It's coach-led. You asking that question at the end of training and doing that often enables players to be part of that process and then to subsequently drive it. You know, they are interpreting the why, and when they interpret the why, they're involved in this and then they can drive it. Coach-led, player-driven, coach-led, player-driven, coach-led, player-driven. And then for those coaches in you know broader systems, college level, professional level, but even at clubs, it's the system. So system supported, better resourced clubs have other coaches, other strength and conditioning, sports scientists, and you know, other influential people, bring them in, system supported, coach-led, player-driven, system supported is absolutely critical. And then you get into the meat of what you're saying, which I've kind of addressed already, but it it's worth repeating, is that you know, your players, um yeah, your job is to create as safe and as healthy an environment as you can for those players is to set the set the the culture, set the environment, what we say and do is the culture, how it feels around here in the environment. And yeah, we want again player-driven, but we also want coach-led. So every behavior, every word, every bit of body language, every silence, every session design, every decision, every action that you engage in as a coach is constantly influencing the experience your players have of your activities, of your sessions, of your coaching practice, of your coaching process. And they carry those experiences with them always. They take them home with them after a session, they carry that session with them overnight into the next day, into the next week. Uh, and and if that makes coaching sound very difficult and tough, well, that's what it is. That is what coaching is. Um, and and and and to be great, a great coach, it is challenging. So I I I I completely agree. I think everything that you do as a coach matters. And when you so for everybody listening in, when you take that mindset scale, performance scale, mindset scale, you take that mindset scale, and you say, Okay, you know, I want to engage my players, I want to help my players learn, I want to help my players compete. You know, this book is very much on the compete side of things, but coaching is about engagement and player development or learning and performance or competing. As a broad brush statement, have that, envision that mindset scale. Can you as a coach help your players be as high as possible on that mindset scale throughout the session? Can you engage them, can you develop them, can you help them perform by by helping them have a high attention, an optimal intensity, a high intent. And you are critical to that to that process. You are critical. To your players' ability to have a higher tension, an optimal intensity, a high intensity to be at the top of that scale so that they engage, develop, and perform.

SPEAKER_09 1:06:13

And that is both the challenge and the joy of coaching. When I say results, not the score, but the performance. There's an extraordinary level of self-satisfaction knowing that what you put forth in terms of your coaching and your presence. I like to use that word often. Your presence has driven the team to a point where they've performed and performed well. Let's wrap this up. The World Cup is coming up, as I noted. I'm curious what your thoughts are. Kind of kind of an outside the box kind of question, so to speak. Managing noise in the World Cup. There's going to be a lot of noise. World Cups, my goodness, they amplify media scrutiny, social media, family demands, travel, particularly, you know, with uh you know being now being hosted with three countries current covering a lot of uh geography. How should athletes uh protect attention and emotional energy without being you know becoming totally closed off? How do they manage the noise?

SPEAKER_05 1:07:18

Yeah, well, I again I think the the coaching stuff has so much to do with this. I mean, I I I'm an Englishman and I I've experienced the last couple of World Cups with uh Gareth Southgate, the great Gareth Southgate being the England manager. Um it's now Thomas Tuchel. But you know, the the the very first thing that Gareth Southgate did years ago um was um uh really start to change the culture, and and culture was everything uh to him uh in many respects. And um he would ensure that those players um had plenty of uh activities to be involved with um so they could enjoy themselves, they could connect uh together uh as a team, establish relationship. That connection for the England team was particularly important because the prior generation, the what was called the golden generation with Rio Ferdinand, Pops' goals, uh Frank Lampard, Stephen Gerrard, Wayne Rooney, David Beckham. I mean, what a team, right? And you can go on, Ashley Cole. Um uh one of the main reasons by their own admission that they they they didn't achieve what could be considered their potential, which was to win a World Cup or even a Euros, was uh uh because they siloed themselves to a degree because they saw themselves, Rio Ferdinand saw himself as a Manchester United player, Frank Lampard saw himself as a Chelsea player, um, Stephen Johard saw himself as a Liverpool player. So whilst at the surface level they were friendly, they saw themselves as enemies. And that was particular to the English team, especially. Uh that has a real uh the theory in psychology is social identity, the identity you have within your social, social group. Uh and so one of the main things Gareth Altate was trying to do, uh, and he had you know success to the point where England went very far in those past two World Cups, uh two or three World Cups, was um, you know, he uh made sure that was plenty for those players to do, uh kept kept them occupied, plenty of rest and recuperation as well. But also, you know, those activities enabled them to connect, establish relationships, and broke down barriers. You know, he also did something very clever in as much as there was always an after versus them uh element of the England team uh and and the press. Uh, and that he actually uh created uh competitions between the team and the press, uh particularly darts matches, right? Darts games of darts. Um uh so he got them together. Um and and and so I'm arguing it you in this way as an actual case study, because I think it is a very powerful case study. You've got to occupy players' attention, you've got to give them plenty of stuff to do. If they're used to playing week in, week out with their club teammates. Well, can you help them connect and establish relationships uh as teammates um in an international setting? Can you help them feel great? Can you help them feel comfortable? Can you help them feel ready? I would add in all the mental aspects that we've spoken about today. Um I I think all of this stuff is absolutely critical because ultimately they have to go out there and perform under pressure. I I would want to see them in their HPM high performance mindset. How many of those camps are going to do that kind of mental skills work? Uh I have no idea. I would certainly be interested in doing something like that and being involved there. Um, but those are the kind of the cultural aspects I think is so important on international duty because you're trying to bring players together who don't ordinarily play together and who are often playing against each other. So that that's absolutely critical.

SPEAKER_09 1:11:18

Rapbo with one final question about the World Cup. As you very well know, the World Cup is the most unique sporting event in the world. Um it is it is unlike any any other sporting event, even the Olympics. What is the one thing, if there is one, what is the one thing that is unique to the World Cup that can affect teams, can affect players, both positively and negatively, that we might not see in a Super Bowl or the World Series or even in the Olympics. Is there something out there that that is unique uh to the game or unique to what might be affecting players because it is indeed the World Cup?

SPEAKER_05 1:12:00

Yeah, and and I think it that social identity piece, again, I mean I I I think we look back to the last World Cup, Argentina, Lionel Messi, um the uh the the sense of identity for those Argentinian players seems very, very strong. I I think this is a a little bit of a challenge we have to English sports at the moment for various sort of socio-historical uh reasons that we we won't necessarily go into. But I I I think that you know it it it it I I think what's unique is playing for country, playing for the flag, um, and doing so with what is essentially not a group of not a not not teammates who are strangers but are stranger than the people that they play in week in, week out. And and and and let me go a bit more technical here and say what's unique is then it it pressures the perceptual cognitive side of the game. Um in as much as you've then got to let's almost back up here to the attentional piece, the focused flashlight and the scanning and searching for gears. If you're playing alongside players that you don't ordinarily play with week in, week out, you know, very soft or um views that players give off that need to be identified by their teammates in order to play cohesively together. And so I would argue that you know uh uh the teams that are better able to do that uh and are quicker to do that may well be the team that tends to win. Um, so you know, being able to play together from a perceptual cognitive perspective, uh having a stronger identity with each other as teammates and with the flag. Um those are kind of the unique things that go on in any kind of World Cup that I think are strong mediators of it. And uh Argentina, I think, did that better than anybody else with the social identity piece last time. Um and I I I think it will be interesting to see what countries come through this time on that one. I'll be interested to see how the US did, especially on home territory.

SPEAKER_09 1:14:20

Indeed, indeed. Our guest today has been Dan Abrahams, who is a noted sport and performance psychologist and author of the latest book, Compete, developing a mental playbook for performance under pressure in sport. Dan, thank you so much for coming on the GP Soccer podcast. I appreciate your time as always. And what's the best way to get this uh your new book?

SPEAKER_05 1:14:39

Yeah, sure. All good online retailers, uh, the usual stuff. Amazon, obviously, but if you don't like getting in on Amazon, then by all means simply Google Compete, Dan Abrahams, and I can assure you there'll be gonna be a whole raft of choices that come up, and I'm sure with free postage and packaging as well. So that's the very best way.

SPEAKER_09 1:15:00

And I suggest uh to all of the uh the coaches out there that you add this book, among others from Dan, add them to your to your coaching library. Giovanni Piccini here, host of the GP Soccer Podcast. We're gonna break for a commercial or two. You know how that works. We'll re-engage on the other side.

SPEAKER_10 1:15:15

Don't you dare go anywhere. Soccer is known around the world as both a sport and an art, with players of all ages and abilities enjoying the game.

SPEAKER_09 1:15:30

Now, the art of the game is only realized after hours of mastering ball skills, learning to communicate with your teammates, and receiving support and instruction from the right coaches. With over 100 years of coaching experience, Director John Barrata and the coaching staff at the Beautiful Games Soccer Academy are pleased to offer their expertise to players and their parents. Coach Barada is one of the most decorated and accomplished soccer coaches in the Northeast with a proven track record of developing both talented players and coaches. The Beautiful Games Soccer Academy believes that success on the soccer field reads success elsewhere in a young adult's life. Players who attend learn the importance of forming good habits, attempting new challenges without the fear of failure, and seeking out support and advice from others. The program fosters the creativity within each player and encourages them to experiment, improvise, and problem solve on the fly. At the Beautiful Game Soccer Academy, every day starts with a smile on our face and a ball at our feet. To learn more about the Beautiful Game Soccer Academy, visit www.beautifulgamesa.com.

SPEAKER_06 1:16:40

Hi, this is Phil Wedding, Director of the International Goalkeeper Coaches Conference and Goalkeeper Coach for the Philadelphia Union. You're listening to the GP Soccer Podcast with your host, Giovanni Piccini.

SPEAKER_09 1:16:52

And welcome to the GP Soccer Podcast, Coach's Corner, where you'll find great tips and advice on how to teach the great game of soccer. This is the GP Soccer Podcast, Coach's Corner. Today's coach is Paul Robinson, where he'll discuss the importance of arrival activities.

SPEAKER_07 1:17:12

This is Paul Robinson. I'm a former girls regional talent club coach with under tens to under 14s, and former boys category one academy coach with under 10s in England. Also, I'm the author of The Soccer Sessions Book, available on Amazon and through large book retailers such as Barnes Noble and Wartstones. It's my pleasure to be on the GP's soccer podcast, Coach's Corner. Today I'd like to talk about arrival activities. Players arriving at different times is a problem all coaches face. Staggered timing makes it difficult to set your players off on a task. You have to keep adapting the activity to various numbers and explaining it to the new arrivals. The activity can be disrupted as participants greet the latecomers. Another challenge is some of the first to arrive may become bored with the activity and have little incentive to persevere with it. You, as a coach, end up spending more time trying to keep the activity fresh or your players on task. Arrival activities are a great way to combat these challenges. Although the words are often used interchangeably, this is not the same as a warm-up. Some activities fall into both categories, but the purpose of the arrival activity is different. The focus of the arrival activities is flexibility and versatility. As the name suggests, arrival activities are used as your players arrive. To facilitate this, your arrival activities must be able to be done in small groups of 1 to 4 players. This enables them to be easily adapted to various numbers of participants. So players arriving late can join in via arrival activities straight away by joining an established group or splitting a group to form new ones. Also, arrival activities should be able to be performed in a small space. This will enable you to use these activities at the side of the pitch if you're using a shared facility. So you can utilize the time before your session starts. This will give you more contact time with your players, which is valuable for their football experience and development. Getting your players engaged quickly minimises the opportunity for behavioural issues and gives you, the coach, time to set up your session. However, your players might have come from school, home, or work where they have been told what to do. Being given something to do as they arrive early to train and can feel too structured. Giving your players unstructured time before the start of the session to connect with friends in a way they choose is an opportunity of giving them ownership and gives them a chance to develop their social skills. We can use this time to connect with players. This time before the session is valuable to get to know your players as individuals and to build trust. Often, players do not care what you know until they know that you care. The best way to use arrival activities is to enable your players to take ownership of them. Teach your players several activities and how to adapt them to various numbers in the first few weeks that you work with them. Also, educate your players as to what they should and should not do before the start of the session. Mark out a relatively small area that does not include large goals that your players should use while waiting for your session to start so they don't interfere with an outside group or over exert themselves and risk injury before the start of the session. As the first players arrive, encourage them to play one of the activities. Join in if required or to inject some energy and enthusiasm. As more players arrive, have them take your place. This activity can grow organically as they organise themselves to the various numbers. They might choose to use a different activity or just to socialise. Either way, they will be safe and have fun. As long as they are not being disruptive or dangerous, give them ownership of this time. This is Paul Robinson, and that's today's coaching tip here on the GP Soccer Podcast Team Coaches Hornet.

SPEAKER_09 1:21:35

This is Soccer News and Analysis with Giovanni Piccini. From the Associated Press. Aston Villa beat Freeberg 3-nil in Istanbul to secure Gunal Emries a record-extending fifth title in the comp in this competition. Two brilliant first half strikes by Yuri Tielemans and Emiliano Buenda put Villa into a 2-0 lead at the break. Morgan Rogers added a third in the second half. It was Villa's first major piece of silverware since winning the English League Cup in 1996, and its first continental title since lifting the European Cup and then the Super Cup in 1982. The Congo soccer team has canceled a three-day World Cup preparation training camp and a planned farewell to fans in the capital of Kinsasha because of outbreak of Ebola in the east of the country. The World Health Organization has declared it a public health emergency of international concern. Iran's national team has said its World Cup training base has been moved from Tucson, Arizona to Tijuana, Mexico after getting approval from FIFA. Ollie McBurney scored in the fifth minute of stoppage time to send Hull into the Premier League after beating Middlesbrough 1-0 in the English Championship playoff final at a scorching Wembley Stadium. The playoff final is labeled one of the world's richest one-off contests because a windfall of at least $270 million in future earnings is on offer for the winning team. Harry Kane, notching Hattrick, for Bayern Munich to beat defending champion Stuttgart 3-0 in the German Cup final in Berlin to compete and to complete another domestic double. Barcelona won its fourth women's Champions League title in at least six seasons by routing its most sorry rivals, Oel Leon, 4-0 in Oslo, Norway, with two goals each from Eva Pejor and Salma Paruelo. The Portland Timbers have mutually parted ways with Coach Phil Neville after two plus seasons. The move comes following Portland's 3-1 loss at home to the league leading earthquakes. The Timbers, at 4-8-2, sit in 13th place in Major League Soccer's Western Conference. Neville finished with a 27-31-24 record at the helm of the Timbers after joining the team ahead of the 2024 season. Portland did not immediately name an interim coach because MLS is on hiatus for the international break and the Men's World Cup, which starts on June the 11th. Inter Miami confirmed Leno Messi has a left hamstring issue, one that has popped up about a week before defending World Cup champion. Argentina is set to begin its training camp for this summer's title defense. After Messi departed Sunday's win over Philadelphia, testing revealed a quote, an overload associated with muscle fatigue. Argentina begins its World Cup schedule June 16th with a pair of friendly schedule in advance of the tournament. AC Milan fired coach Massimiliano Allegri and CEO Giorgio Furlani after it missed out on next season's Champions League via a season-ending slump. That's soccer news and analysis from the AP. Next up, the Your Report with Ralph Ferrigno.

SPEAKER_08 1:25:09

This is the GP Soccer Podcast, English Premier League, and European Soccer Report with your host, Ralph Ferrigno.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:28

Effectively, the league seasons of the European clubs ended last weekend. And with only the Champions League final left to be resolved this weekend, I thought we'd take a look today at the various qualifiers for European competitions for next season. So let's start off with the major leagues. And the news going in was that England and Spain had secured two extra European performance spots based on the displays of their teams during the 25-26 European campaign. And effectively what that means in the case of both leagues is the team that finishes fifth gets an automatic Champions League spot. So the English Premier League is well known as being the most followed league in world football. And Arsenal won their first title in 22 years. In the end they maybe crawled over the line, but credit Mikel Arteta and his men, he got there. Manchester City, Manchester United, and Aston Villa, who won the Europa League and also finished fourth, also made it, as did Liverpool, despite a very poor season via a European performance spot. Now there were some surprises at the Europa League level, with Little Bournemouth and newly promoted Sunderland making the cut. And they could be joined by Crystal Palace if they win the Conference League final this Wednesday when they play the Spanish club Rea Valacano. And I'll come back to them very, very shortly when we look at La Liga. The eighth place now converts to a Conference League spot with Brighton and Hovalbian taking the slot. And again, this is only their second season in European competition, but a great accomplishment for a club that's considered to be one of the smaller clubs in the Premier League. In La Liga, the champions were Barcelona with Real Madrid, Villarreal, Atletico Madrid qualifying via the top four spots, and Real Betis via the European performance spot. The Europa League goes to Celta Vigo and Real Sociedad, the latter via the Copa del Rey Triumph over Atletico Madrid. And so the only Thing that's left is the Conference League, which is Catafe, and as I mentioned earlier, Rea Valicano. If they should win in the Conference League final this week, they will be moved into the Europa League. And what this means is that the Conference League spot will pass down to the next place team in the league, and that is Valencia. The Bundesliga Bayern Munich yet again were totally dominant and arguably next to PSG, the best club in Europe right now. They will be joined in the Champions League by Borussia Dortmund, Red Bull Leipzig, and Stuttgart, who have really pulled their socks up these last few years coming from the second tier, and now they are in the Champions League. The Europa League spots go to Hoffenheim and Bayer Leverkusen. The Conference League. Freiburg lost the Europa League final to Aston Villa, and because of that they must settle only for a UEFA Conference League qualification playoff spot. In Syria A, there were some big, big surprises. Not a surprise was Inter Milan winning the league again and being joined by Napoli and Roma in the Champions League. Big surprise, Como 1907, made it for the first time ever. So that is a great accomplishment and uh it'll be interesting to see how they do. The Europa League spots went to Lazio and Bologna, the latter being Coppa Italia finalists. Conference League goes to Firentina. Now the big big shock here was two of the traditional major powerhouses of Italian football, Juventus and AC Milan, did not qualify for any European football next year. Ligue. Surprise, surprise, surprise. Paris Saint Germain yet again with a champions, with Lenz and Lille also making it. And a fourth place went to Lyon, but they have to go through qualification playoffs. The Europa League went to fifth place Marseille with a new team. Stayed René finishing in sixth place. AS Monaco that generally qualifies missed out in seventh. So those are the major leagues. Let's look at some of the smaller leagues of Europe and let's start off in the Netherlands. Now the Eredivisi have earned an automatic third Champions League spot, although the third place goes for a playoff round. But they did so as the league coefficient has risen of late. So Eindhoven and Feiernood locked down the top two direct slots with a surprise team, NEC Nijmegen taking the third spot. Europa League went to FC 20 and AZ Alkmar, and there was a shock here. The mighty mighty Ajax only qualifying for the Conference League. So it seems this season in Europe have been quite a number of surprises. In Belgium, Club Bruger won the league yet again, and they will be joined by Royal Union Saint Gilois, who have to go through a Champions League third qualifying round to make the main part of the tournament. A surprise team and an up-and-coming team made it into third place to claim the Europa League spot, and that was Sint Tudenese, with the mighty mighty yet another surprise, and elect only making the conference league. Things pretty much went um to form in Portugal, although Benfica losing Jose Mourinho as their manager slipped into the Europa League spot with champions Porto and runners up Sporting Cristal of Lisbon taking the next spot in the Champions League. So as I said, Benfica were in the Europa League and the Conference League slot went to Braga. Now, there's a couple of countries, namely Czechoslovakia, well it's not Czechoslovakia anymore, Czech Republic and Greece. They are being touted as the new direct elite. And what that means is for the first time in years, leagues outside the top seven or so have club have their champions pushed directly into the elite 36 team stage due to the excellent record of clubs in recent seasons. So the beneficiaries of this in the Czech Republic, Slavia Prague, and in the Turkish Super League, Galatasaray, they will go directly into the league phase. Meantime Greece, AEK Athens just edged out Olympiakos with AEK Athens going into the main part of the draw and then Olympiakos being moved to the Europa League. Now there was quite a contest in Scotland where, and I feel sad saying this, Heart of Midlothian were edged out minutes from claiming the title and taking the Scottish Championship away from one of the old firm for the first time in 40 years. Celtic kind of rebounded from a poor start to the season under veteran manager Martin O'Neill, and they won the league and they also claimed the cup as well. So it was a very notable double for Celtic and Martin O'Neill. Heart of Midlothian will still play in the Champions League, though they do have to go through qualifying with a spot in the second qualifying round. Rangers made the Europa League third qualifying round. Motherwell qualified in fourth place for the Conference League second qualifying round, as did Hibernian in fifth place. And all that leaves to tell is the winners of this weekend's Champions League final between Arsenal and Paris Saint Germain will not mean that either another English or French team will qualify for Champions League competition. Now the twist here is that instead of passing that vacant league face spot down to a club from their own league, UEFA rules dictate it will now go to the highest ranked domestic champion in the qualifying round based on individual UEFA club coefficient points. And the beneficiary here appears to be Shakhtar Doneetch, who won the Ukrainian Premier League. So they will now have to bypass the qualifying rounds, which can be quite grueling. So that's a quick look at who's doing what for next year in European UEFA competition. Next week I will go over the three finals with everybody looking forward to the UEFA Champions League final this coming weekend. So until then, enjoy your football wherever you're finding it, and I will see you next week.

SPEAKER_09 1:36:00

Hey, this is Giovanni Pacini. You all know me as a soccer coach and a clinician, but did you know that I'm a professional voiceover artist as well? I own and operate GP voiceover services, and my voice has been heard on radio, television, and over a variety of media platforms. Anywhere a voice is needed to tell your story, promote your organization, or bring words to life, GP voiceover services is your choice. I have a background in radio, have appeared in professional video productions, as well as having hosted cable television programs. I will work with you for your production to understand your preferences and plan just the right approach for your project. I also offer private consulting and training for those interested in exploring the voiceover profession. To learn more about GP voiceover services, visit my website at GPvoiceoverservices.com or email me at GP4 Voiceover, and that's the number for, at gmail.com. Hey there, Giovanni Piccini here, host of the GP Soccer Podcast. And I want to reach out to all of my great listeners who own pets and even those who don't. Listen, your local animal rescue organization is on a mission to provide loving homes for pets in need, and they need your help. Whether through adoption, fostering, or financial contributions, every bit of support counts. Join me in making a positive impact. Visit your local shelter today and help give these wonderful animals the second chance they so deserve. Together, we can create a community where every animal is cared for and loved.

SPEAKER_02 1:37:36

Hi guys, this is Allison Foley from Foley Athletic Advising. And you're listening today to the GP Soccer Podcast with the one, the only, the great Giovanni Puccini.

SPEAKER_09 1:38:00

And welcome back to the GP Soccer Podcast. I am your host. I am your able host. I am your I'm your host. Let's just leave it at that. Giovanni Puccini. This is the last segment of the show, the last block of the show, which is entitled, which is called The American Soccer Revolution, where I analyze, throw out, dump, blow up, dissect, rethink, overhaul, scrap, all if not many things having to do with American soccer. I want to share with you today some content I pulled off, pulled off the internet. This is from a gentleman by the name of Matt Dumichel. And as I noted earlier in the opening block of the show, he's the creator of the Youth Sports Systems Health Guide. And this little piece of information here, this bit of content, is entitled Retention of Youth Sports Players. Not very long. Let me share it with you. The best organizations in youth sports are not the ones with the best players at 12 years old. They're the ones that still have players at 17. Think about that for a second. We spend so much time in youth sports talking about selection, rankings, elite pathways, winning now, identifying talent early, but almost never ask the bigger question. How many kids are we actually keeping in the game long enough to develop? Because development is not linear. Some kids dominate early, some plateau, some struggle physically until later, some don't gain confidence until they finally find the right coach, team, role, or even the environment. And some are just late bloomers in every sense of the word. But if the environment becomes too expensive, too political, too stressful, too exclusive, then kids leave before we ever get to see what they could have become. That's the real danger of systems obsessed with early success. They unintentionally narrow the pipeline before development is even close to finished. Imagine if Josh Allen stopped stopped after getting no offers. Dennis Rodman quit after being overlooked. Jamie Vardy gave up in a non-league football. Antonio Gates believed basketball was his only path. Late developers exist everywhere, and I feature them every Thursday on my page. The problem is many systems aren't built to keep them around long enough. And honestly, this conversation is bigger than sports. Because the child who stays involved in sports longer is more likely to experience teamwork, failure, leadership, accountability, resilience, belonging. Those lessons matter whether they become a pro athlete or not. And statistically, almost all of them won't. So maybe the question organizations should ask isn't how do we find the best players earlier? Maybe it's how do we create environments that keep more kids developing longer? Because that is where long-term success for both people and programs is really built. If you're involved in youth sports, what's the one thing that would help keep more kids uh in the game longer? These are the exactly these are the exactly the conversations driving the work I'm doing with organizations now. So there you have it. Uh a terrific piece, and uh it just transcends soccer. Um, you know, uh and this has to do with obviously all sports. You know, the bottom line here, without belaboring the topic here, um, is that the kids have fun. And those involved, those adults who are involved uh in youth sports, uh ensure that there's there is an absolute infusion of joy in all aspects of these young players and lives. Um and then secondly, or maybe even 1A, because it's very important, is to ensure that you have teachers of the game who are certified, qualified, who are enthusiastic, and know how to appropriately uh create uh environments where teaching and learning can really, really uh occur. And last but not least, have patience. Have patience. As as Matt uh notes here uh in in his content here, that uh all kids don't develop all at the same time. They all they they they do it in fits and starts, and uh some earlier, some later. We must be patient. Because it is a travesty, and I'll end of this note, it is a travesty to think that uh so many kids can can be deprived of the wonderful opportunities that sports give them because of, well, coaches, organizations, clubs that want to win too soon and trying to find the best talent at the earliest ages. Well, ladies and gentlemen, that's our show for today. I hope uh you you like the show. Uh if you like what you hear overall, please tell everyone. And remember, those likes matter. You can follow the GP Soccer Podcast, all of our social media, and new episodes are available every Wednesday morning. What a great way to start your Wednesday. Don't forget to check out my website at GPSoccerpodcast.com. And if you're interested in advertising on the show, then email me at GP4Soccer, and that's the number four at yahoo.com. This is your host, Giovanni Pacini, and I will catch you later.