10 Tips to Become a More Confident Footballer:
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I have been putting out free content across 5 social media platforms for about 6 years and one of the most common questions that I get in the DM’s or via email is “how can I become more confident on the pitch?”
This the common message:
“Ric, I play so well in training, but once I step onto the pitch for game time, I feel like I’ve never played football before..”
Obviously, this is something a lot of footballers struggle with, and it’s quite understandable.
You feel super sharp during individual and team training, but once game time comes, you will super anxious, tight and you’re breathing heavy..
Why could that be?
Everything is about perspective, so there are two ways to look at it.
1.Anxiety (negative emotion)
-You can look at the “nervousness” before games as a negative emotion and you can overthink it and let it make you tight and nervous or you can look at it as a positive emotion.
2.Anxiety (positive emotion)
-When you look at it positively, you can use the anxiety as excitement to pump you up (adrenaline) and let it get you ready for the game.
You need to realize, even pro footballers at the top level have “nerves” before games, but they know how to deal with it because they’ve developed and innate confidence in themselves and their ability.
With all of that being said, I want to armor you with 10 of my top tips for you to become more confident as a footballer.
If you read through the full article, there is a gift waiting at the end of the article 🙂
Tip 1:
Take Care of the Things You Can Control:
This is exactly what I talk about all the time on my social media platforms. Take care of your:
- Mindset
- Nutrition
- Technical Work
- Recovery Work
- Sleep
- Tactical Work (game analysis)
When you take complete control and complete responsibility over 6 of these things (and everything else in your control related to your development), and you work hard and train smart and consistently, you will automatically become a more confident player.
You will become more confident because you will get more repetitions all around, but you will also perform, feel and look better than you ever have before.
You can’t wait for qualities or opportunities to fall into your lap. You must go out there, chase those opportunities and work hard to make them happen!
Nothing will come easy in life, and that’s what football will teach you. You have to work hard for what you want; you will not be given anything!
The second part of taking control of the controllables is when you step onto the pitch, you know that you have done more than the player next to you, and that preparation will allow you to feel better mentally and physically.
One of the Greatest Quotes of All Time:
– “Fail to Prepare, Prepare to Fail”
-Benjamin Franklin
If you don’t prepare, you are bound to fail. So, control what you can control and let the rest of the small stuff fall into place.
If you can’t control it, let it be. This will allow your mind and body to be free and relaxed.
Tip 2:
In the beginning of the game, play simple balls and connect your passes.
-Don’t overcomplicate things and overdo things.
-Get yourself into the game. Get a rhythm for the tempo and get a feel for what’s going on.
-“Fit in and then stand out!”
-Obviously, if you see your opportunity, take it with aggression and pace, but be smart about it.
-You build confidence by layering things on top of each other.
-This is the concept here.
-Connect passes, find your rhythm, take a couple touches, see where your opponent likes to stand.
-Once your confident and you feel good; use your specialties and strengths, but there’s no need to overdo it in the beginning of the game.
Tip 3:
Play towards your strengths as a player:
Your goal should be do double down on your strengths and make them as good as you possibly can!
The first step to doubling down and becoming better at your strengths is to properly self-analyze yourself:
I want you to get your journal out and write down your top 3 strengths as a player.
-What do your strengths bring to your team?
-How do your strengths help your team win games?
If you don’t know your strengths, you can do a couple of things:
-Start analyzing your game film and try to pick out and identify your strengths.
-Ask your coach what he/she thinks your strengths are.
-Ask your teammates what your strengths are.
Once you have those written down, I want you to put a huge focus of your individual training and your extras after team training into them.
It doesn’t have to be the “main focus/priority” of your training, but you have to make sure you get them in, and make it a consistent practice of yours.
It could be 10-20 minutes, but make sure you’re working on them with a high intensity with the focus being on quality.
The better your strengths are, the more you will stand out as a player. This will help your team win games and help you up the ranks as a player and a leader.
When you go towards your strengths and you perform positive actions based on them, you will automatically become more confident as a footballer because you can change games for your team.
Tip 4:
Stay away from your weaknesses as best as possible..
This really differs from player to player; it depends on your current level and where you are in your footballing journey.
Once again, you must properly self-analyze yourself and be honest with yourself.
If your weaknesses are holding you back from getting to the next level in your game, I would recommend focusing on them 5x more than your strengths, but if you think your strengths can “hide” those weaknesses in a sense, focus more on your strengths.
For example:
One of my weaknesses as a Center Defensive Midfielder is turning with a guy on my back.
I’ve never been good at shifting the player with my back to goal, so, I don’t get myself into the positions where I have to turn a guy…
Instead, I’ll get into proper space, and already be on the half turn, so I can get the ball to my front foot and already be going forward without having to turn someone.
Once I’m turned and going forward, I can use my strengths and passing range to get myself out of the situation and find the best possible solution.
And if I do get into a situation where a player is on my back, I will simply play the ball right back to my teammate and find space again.
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Tip 5:
If you make a mistake, no big deal. Just think about your next action.
-You might say, what if my teammates yell at me?
This is an issue that a lot of players face, and it’s super normal.
Your main goal when it comes to this situation should be asking yourself:
“How can I get my focus back to the present moment and the next action, instead of focusing on the past?”
If you really think about it; 1, 2, 3 or even 4 mistakes will not make a difference in how you played for that entire game.
The most important thing is; how quickly can you get your focus back?
At the end of the day, if you take 76 good actions out of 80 (offensively and defensively), that’s an excellent game.
The problem here is: if you make a mistake, you naturally will want to talk poorly to yourself and be “angry” at yourself because you know you can do better.
But, once you lighten up and you don’t judge yourself too hard, and you can almost “laugh” about the mistake and move on, that’s when you can bring yourself back to full focus.
When you make a mistake, if you can constantly shift your focus to “next action,” and smile after a bad action instead of being angry at yourself, you will have better future actions.
When you lose the ball, you have two options:
- Immediately press and try to get the ball back within 5 seconds.
- Put your head down and be angry.
I would say the first option is the one that will make you a world-class player. The second option will make you a world-class Sunday League baller.
Counter Pressing:
If you’re familiar with “gegen-pressing” (counter pressing), this has a lot to do with shifting your focus immediately to the next action.
If you lose the ball in the offensive third of the pitch, and you immediately are pressing to get that ball back, you can already be higher up the pitch and have a chance at goal.
But, if you lose the ball, put your head down (something Klopp would bench you for), and you don’t press, you have no chance at goal.
The Importance of Meditation:
This is the massive importance of meditation (quickly being able to shift yourself from the past into the present), and worrying about the present, because that’s the only thing that really matters.
The only thing that changes the future is the present, not worrying about the past. (Hope this makes sense!)
Tip 6:
Communicate and lead vocally and by example.
You should have the goal of being a leader and positive role model to others no matter “who you are” and where you go.
When you have the attitude of wanting to make others better, people will want to be around you.
Coaches’ and General Managers’ see and feel that and will want you to be a part of their team because there is nothing like a strong, positive culture within a football organization.
-When you step onto the pitch, your goal should be to communicate positively and lead by example. Tell people when they did something well (positive reinforcement), and if a teammate makes a mistake, bring them up instead of criticizing them.
This will automatically make you and others’ around you more confident footballers because you are communicating positive energy to others which will directly reflect on yourself and your play on the pitch.
-You want to bring the level of the team up and bring a positive attitude on and off the field. Make people smile, have fun with teammates but make sure you mean business when you step onto the pitch.
3 Ways to Be a Better Leader:
- Watch a lot of Pro Football Matches so you can develop a better football IQ and you can direct players on your team where to be in different situations.
- Study leadership from mentors and other positive figures. My favorite guy to study when talking positive leadership is Jocko Willink.
- You need to be the fittest player on your team. When you are cardiovascularly fit, you will be able to communicate the whole game, and I am 100% sure, people will notice that, because it’s very uncommon!
Tip 7:
Judge Yourself Less & Let The Game Come to You
If you play poorly, what’s the big deal? It’s not the end of the world.
You started playing because you love the game, and you enjoy it.
I notice too many players putting way too much unneeded pressure on themselves to play well and it seems to make them nervous, tight and stress them out (which is the last thing you want).
If you put too much pressure on yourself to always play well, you will take the fun and joy out of the game.
When you go into the game, and you “don’t try too hard,” and you trust in your technical and physical training, you will play well without “overthinking” it.
This may sound counterintuitive but if you go into the game with the attitude of “who really cares if I play poorly…” you will be able to take the pressure off yourself and just focus on having fun.
When you’re having fun, you will become confident through simply laughing and smiling which will allow you to play your best football.
And, at the end of the day, football is just a game. I get it, you play it because you love it, but if you play poorly, it’s not the end of the world (even if it may feel like that sometimes).
Tip 8:
Game Analysis:
Video doesn’t lie.
This is one of the most important tools that you can use to improve yourself and to become a more confident footballer.
There are a couple of ways to go about analyzing games:
- Watch your own games:
This is the best thing that you can do because you can honestly self-analyze yourself and see what you’ve done well and what you can do better.
The goal is to be as detailed as possible when noting down these actions.
Be Specific:
-How was the pass you made? Was it played to the correct foot of your teammate based on the opponents’ pressure?
-How was the run you made? Was your timing correct?
Based off your honest, self-analysis of your game, what do you believe you need to work on during the training week to become better for the next game?
- Watch pro players in your position:
There are a couple of things that you can do. You have 3 options, and I would recommend doing all 3.
- Watch a Live Game:
Watch a Pro Game Like a Student, not as a Fan:
-Your goal is to pick a player that you want to analyze in your position and closely watch all of their on and off the ball movements.
For example, let’s say that you are a right back and you are looking to analyze Dani Carvajal.
-Focus on Dani’s for one half of the game and notice his movements on and off the ball, his decision making etc. You can take notes or you can just watch it. This will “plant” his actions within your mind, so you can replicate his movements and action on the pitch.
When you go to training, your goal is to be able to implement some of the things he did and then work to transfer that into a game situation.
- Find a replay Real Madrid game:
Simply search it on YouTube:
“Real Madrid vs.”
Pick any 10–15 minute segment of the game.
-Once again, follow Dani’s movements on and off the ball.
-The advantage of having the replay is you can rewind and watch his actions more closely and be more specific.
- Type into YouTube, “Dani Carvajal vs.”
-Many YouTube “game analysts” have made our life much easier by taking all of a specific players’ actions and put them into one video.
-Once again, the main goal here is to learn what he does, how he moves, his decisions and try to transfer it to the pitch.
-This is something you can do when you’re in more of a rush and you don’t have time to watch a full game.
-I like to do this about 2-3 hours before game time to get my mind and movements fresh and sharp.
Tip 9:
Constantly scan your shoulders and be aware of your surroundings
You should always be aware of surroundings as a footballer so you can find and create space for yourself and your team.
This will allow you to become a more confident footballer because you will know what’s coming and where the pressure is coming from.
You have to find space and make decisions based off of the pressure of your opponent.
You can incorporate this into your individual and team training by constantly working on scanning your shoulders and picking your head up.
Your goal is to take your first touch out of pressure to get your team and the ball out of pressure, so you don’t lose the ball.
You need to know 1-2 decisions that you can make before getting the ball.
How do you do that?
You scan the pitch and get a complete snapshot of the field in front of you. Based off of your teammates’ positioning and where you are on the pitch, you can make your future decisions.
Tip 10:
Play your role in the team.
-Listen to what your coach wants you to do and do it.
-Your goal should be to do what you do best and don’t overcomplicate things.
For example:
-If you’re playing as a Center Defensive Midfielder and your coach wants you to sit in front of the back four, defend and win the second balls there, do it. There’s no need to go out wide and support the wingers if your coach doesn’t want you to do so.
-If your coach wants you to play simple and let your attacking midfielders play the final pass, just do that. Keep the ball for your team, play the ball through the lines to your attacking players and let them play the “killer pass.” Obviously, if you see the pass, play it, but you understand what I mean. There’s no need to overdo things.
Once you do this and listen to your coaches’ commands, you will get confidence of them. Once you get the confidence of the coach, you will get more game time and you will be given more of a “freer role.” When you have that, you will instantly become a more confident footballer.
It may sound “overly obedient,” but they are in control of your playing time and getting to the next level so I would try to assimilate to their style.
I hope these 10 tips will help you become a better and more confident footballer. As always, don’t just read the tips, make sure you implement them.
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