Psychology is one of the most important parts of your soccer game. You probably know that playing soccer requires both mental and physical abilities.

Even if you have the best soccer skills, it will not be worth any much if you fail to perform well under pressure.

Learning how to handle stress, pressure and other common mental issues will truly increase your performance on the field by several levels.

Focus on What You Want to Achieve

It is important to have both short term and long term goals for your soccer career in order to motivate you to practice and develop your game.

If you don’t see any future with your soccer playing it is pretty easy to get discouraged and consider doing something else with your free time.

However, it is equally important to have realistic goals. For example you can’t expect to get to the professional level in 2 years if you are playing in a mediocre soccer league.

Instead, try to do your best and try to make it to a higher ranked club in order to increase your chances of becoming pro.

Concentration is Crucial

During a soccer game you should always keep yourself 100% focused no matter if you win or lose.

One thing you can do in order to keep yourself completely focused during your games is to never let yourself think about non-related game topics.

While I was studying at university I often found myself running around and worrying about my examination results instead of focusing on the game.

Of course, this had several impacts on my performance as I couldn’t concentrate on the game properly.

You should also know that worrying about non-related soccer things is energy consuming and you really don’t want to waste your energy on such things (at least, not during your soccer game).

I usually get rid of these issues by saying to myself that I don’t care if I don’t manage to make my examination.

Simply, I can’t affect the results because the test is already in the hands of my professor 🙂

So if you feel overwhelmed by personal issues simply try to relax your mind and tell yourself that you can’t affect everything in your life.

Proper Rest and Relaxing is Also Important

As a human being it is pretty normal to get nervous before a soccer game (especially if it is a cup final or similar).

However, you should try to avoid getting to nervous as it could affect your performance negatively.

Instead, keep yourself alert but have your body relaxed. By doing this you will be able to perform better during pressure.

One thing you can do in order to relax is to take the soccer for what it is: just a simple game.

Don’t see the upcoming game as a battle for life or death because it will not help you perform well.

I always like to bring my MP3 player and listen to music before the start of the game. This helps me get relaxed and focused.

Summary

It is your task to prepare yourself for your games. If you want to achieve bigger results than just playing in an amateur league you’ll also need to put more emphasize on preparing yourself mentally (and physically as well) for your games.

For example, a lot of players tend to avoid soccer fitness sessions. Guess what, learn to love these! Yes, they are boring but it has to be done!

Don’t start your game with negative thoughts. Even professional soccer players have “off” soccer games. Guess what – they train better, smarter, and focus on victory anyway! You can do it!