Should the coach be the first mental coach of his team?

In the world of modern football, mental preparation has become an essential pillar of the performance of players and teams. This psychological dimension, long neglected, is now increasingly recognized for its impact on sporting success. In this context, the question that arises is: should the coach be the first mental coach of his team?  To answer this question, Adrien Cabon, Sports Mental Coach Specialized in football illuminates us.

The central role of the mental trainer

As a coach you are the person who meets your players most. You see them behave in a certain way with any training on the field, but also during the most informal moments with their teammates.

This proximity to them can allow you to detect signs of lack of trust, bad stress management or demotivation in a player. And you can also act on these psychological factors to have an impact on their behavior and therefore their performance.

On the other hand, to be able to act effectively on these mental aspects, it is essential that your players trust you!

Because of your leader status within the group, you are necessarily perceived as a figure of authority by your players and therefore you have an influence on their mentality. However, this is true only if your players really trust you.

And as in any human relationship, the trust that your players will bring to you will depend on your communication with them.

Many players who accompany in the single follow -Up they tell me “I can’t trust the coach anyway”. And when I ask them “what does it make you say?”, They often answer me “he tells me that he will do something but in the end he does not do it or does the opposite”.

So I don’t think I’m wrong by saying that the main expectation of your players is that you are reliability: to say what you think and do what you say. If you respect this principle, your players trust you and you will have the opportunity to have a real impact on their mind.

The coach as a mental coach: advantages and limits

Assuming that the role of mental coach for a coach necessarily benefits from advantages and disadvantages.

In my opinion, as a coach you can never do the work of a mental coach with your players because of your status. Even when mental preparers are found in clubs today, some players do not prefer to go and see them for fear of saying their exchanges to the coach and who penalizes them.

However, even if you cannot work deep with your players how a mental coach can do, you can still be the first mental coach of your group!

Whether through your talks, your videos or perhaps your individual interviews with the players, you can use all these moments to positively influence the beliefs of your players at the mental level. Only and without the help of a mental coach, here are the mental skills that you can still influence: motivation, trust and emotional management.

Here are some suggestions to help you positively influence these specific mental skills:

• To have an impact more easily on their motivation, your players must associate their individual goal with the common collective objective.
• To positively influence their trust, you must help them stay focused on their skills rather than the result.
• For emotional management, you must embody what you want to transmit to your players.

Trust a mental coach

As an entity, it is therefore interesting to consider you the first mental coach of your group. By applying these suggestions you can also start having a positive impact on the mood of your players.

But if you want to allow your players to do a depth job, you will need a mental coach. And don’t worry, the role of the mental coach is not to go against your speech or to make you lose control over your group.

On the contrary, it is there to help you put your players in the optimal mental provisions for performance.