GoalKeeping mind set..

Elite Goal Keeping Mind set

By Noel Flannery

World championship winning Mind/ performance coach..

Tour golf, World Snooker, World Darts and Goalkeeping..

Intro

If I asked 1000 of the leading Goal keepers what there job in the team was,

they would think ive lost my mind asking such a dumb question!

“to stop the ball going in the Goal”would come the response every time.

I mean the job description is in the job title so it should be obvious.

But thats not their job, it might be their aim though.

I would say a Goalkeepers job is to put them selves in a position to perform at the very best of their abilities to focus and bury themselves in a task that they can control IE their performance , and not to make their job something that they cant control.

What we can control….

Our selfs and thats it…

What we cant control…

Everything else Especially the result..

You as a goalkeeper could have the game of your life and still lose the match 3-0.

Im often faced with quizzical looks from Golfers, When I ask “what you trying to do with this putt”?

“well put it in the hole” comes the response..

Now you may feel thats a sensible answer to an all too obvious question…

It would be the same to Goalkeeper, they would be telling me there job is to stop the ball 

going in the goal..

Now this is key, 

Why would we give our selfs a task that we cant complete?

We are not in control of being able to do any of these tasks..

The golfer, is putting a ball that like every ball is not PERFECTLY round, there putting on a living breathing thing, IE the green, they never made the ball, or the club, cut the grass or cut the hole ..  

They are not in control of the weather and moisture levels in the atmosphere and everyone of these items can cause the ball not to drop in the hole..

Once they have hit the ball their control over what happens next has gone..

For you Goal keepers, I can assure you that similarly if we took industrial measuring equipment the goal posts are not all exactly the same, gusts to wind can of course alter ball flight as can temperature changes that will effect the pressure of the ball which in turn is a hand made item and will react differently each time its struck… 

Mostly though your certainly not in control of how the striker hits a shot coming at you..

If he hits the perfect shot not you or anyone can do anything about that…

So with the above a players undoing is letting out come, results upset them…

Then the conditions a player is in are in charge of their well being…

Elite sports persons need to be in charge of the space they are in regardless of what the score line is or the enormity of the match.

We are not in control of what colour of car the neighbor buys and we don’t care either do we?

Why would we? We are not in control of that.

And yet elite sports persons get upset every day when the ball does not drop, or the save missed by millimeters….

If the striker on the opposing team has the game of his life the one he will tell his grandkids about decades from now there is nothing you or anyone is going to do about that…

Unless by some amazing coincidence you have your game of your life on the same game!

So what is our job?

Our job is to bury our selfs in the task at hand…

Matters not if your a World snooker star on the last black for the title 

or Goal keeper with a team of hungry players on route to you with the ball..

All there is is this moment nothing else just this moment..

Being right here right now. 

 This free kick thats about to commence, it matters not if its in practice at the training ground, or its the closing mins of a tied FA cup Final, the process is the same.

There is no special effort there is no trying harder, every play is maximum focus on the task in hand..

Make process king, not results we cant control.

The process demands an Intensity that needs to be there constantly at all times, both in practice and on the pitch..

Being present in the now..

For its never not this moment.

 Many players choke or feel nervous before say a penalty,

 both striker and the Goal keeper.

They are giving away focus to the future, IE the result of if the ball is in the net or not, 

a result they cannot either of them control and has not happened yet anyway the ball is still to be struck.

Their job is not to score or to save the ball there job is to be buried in the now not the future, or the past..

Like a keeper maybe be telling themselves before hand ive not saved a single penalty this year!

Striker maybe be saying don’t lean back like last time and put it over the bar!

Both are leaking energy leaking focus on what happened in the past..

Its all about now this moment..

One of Basketball Legends Michael Jordans coaches said..

“Michael is the best of all time because he has always been in the moment more than anyone else”

Trust

Confidence would be what a player would be chasing , craving for indeed..

Most players version of how that comes about though is Flawed..

Hence they look for it in the wrong place.

Most would think.....

 “im playing well and I made some great saves and I feel really confident now”

So its proof First and then I will feel confident..

This is like standing on ice… Your confidence is linked to out side circumstances..

Circumstances we cant control…

If this goes south, and it will then a Goal keeper will put him self in a position where his confidence can be shattered by a Striker playing his A game..

And fall through the ice you will..

Its very easy to be confident when things are going well, but the Elite can still maintain

that even when things are not as they not reliant on results for their confidence to still be there..

Confidence , faith a belief in our own abilities needs to be unaffected by what the situation we are in..

Performance comes this way…

Confidence 1st then performance will follow…

What is Confidence?

Ultimately its a Trust that something deep inside our selfs has got this..

When at their best a player reacts instinctively, this is our subconscious minds at work

where all of our best stuff is in any task..

When we are not confident or tense and fearing the future (letting this goal in) or not trusting we get in our own way..

Slow responses, tight body and a lack of being in the moment cause a player to not perform at there best…

When we are confident, trusting, buried in the moment your mind and body are clear of the baggage that will slow a Goalkeeper down..

Its all about feeling that anything is possible and learning that we all are in charge of feeling like that, from this the best version of our selves can flourish..

Goalkeepers your job is to bring your very best to the pitch, not to stop the ball going in the net…