Dan Abrahams is a sport psychology consultant who specializes in soccer. Abrahams joins the National Soccer Coaches Association of America to share his insights into soccer psychology. All thoughts and opinions in this regular feature are that of Dan Abrahams and not necessarily reflective of the NSCAA. You can find out more about his new book "Soccer Tough" at danabrahams.com.

Chapter 5 of "Soccer Tough" discusses the science and art of a fundamental mindset skill in soccer – the ability to focus and deal with the myriad of distractions the game throws at a player.

Being a game of fractions, milliseconds and inches soccer is won and lost the world over through human error more than anything else. To me more goals are scored or conceded due to a player being distracted than for thrilling moments of excellence. Defeat is driven more by error than brilliance.

As I mention in "Soccer Tough:"

Performance focus in soccer is vital – a little like the importance that a steering wheel has to a car. You can have the self-belief and confidence (the engine of the car) but without the necessary focus and concentration on the pitch (the steering wheel), a soccer player’s game will be erratic and inconsistent. A player can be immensely talented, have great technique, and yet his career may falter due to poor focus.

Lose performance focus and you can lose your technical game and tactical execution. Switching off leads to mistakes, to indecision, to a lack of awareness and to slow anticipation. Take your mind off the game for a second and you can cause an array of problems for yourself and your team mates. Switch off as a defender and the opposition striker can nip in front of you and get a shot away. A distracted midfielder won’t see the runs of his team mates or the movement of the opposition. An unfocused striker will fail to find space or lose his marker. Goals will be in short supply!

Performance focus underpins co-ordination, game intelligence, and speed of thought. To me, it is that invisible mediator of success that separates – its abundance wins places in the first team, college scholarships and professional contracts.

So how does a coach go about developing a soccer player’s focus? Well it’s not about helping players develop more focus. It’s not about helping them go into some deep trance state. In soccer it’s all about where they place their focus.

When a soccer player switches off, to my mind he is not shutting down his focus. He is merely switching his focus to the wrong thing. So a defender might focus on the ball too much rather than focusing on both the ball and the man he is marking. This isn’t a lack of focus rather it is a focus in the wrong direction. Similarly a goalkeeper might focus on the crowd of players in the penalty area on a crossing ball while a more useful focus would be on the ball itself. A striker might focus on his marker rather than on space to move into, while a midfielder might watch play on the left side of the pitch so losing awareness of the run the right winger is making.

It’s not just things external to you, such as the ball or the opposition, that can destroy performance focus. A soccer player may be too focused on his inner voice. He may be talking to himself about the mistake he made five minutes before or how long there is in the game to go. If he’s focused internally on either of these he won’t be focusing on the tasks he has to execute in the game.

The concept of "controlling the controllables" is close to cliché in the world of sport psychology – largely because it’s such a pertinent and powerful statement. It rings true and is an underpinning component of the ability to focus the mind correctly as one competes. A soccer player who allows his or her focus to slide onto the things he or she can’t control is one who is likely to be substituted due to a series of errors.

As a coach you must help you players to focus on the things he or she can control and ignore the things that are out of control. A few examples of the ‘uncontrollables’ include the referee, the score, the state of the pitch, the weather and the outcome of a game. Yet how many players allow themselves to be drawn into these magnetic aspects of game day. The bad pitch, a goal against and a refereeing decision tend to attract the attention of players – a damaged focus that negatively impacts the execution of responsibilities within their role.

Next time I will draw from Soccer Tough and explain how your players can keep their mind focused on the controllables. For now, just by clarifying the concept of uncontrollable your players can make giant strides towards a more focused performance.

There are dozens of additional articles related to psychology, visit the Online Resource Library. There you can find articles such as Wayne Harrison's "A Player Psychological Performance Program" or Giovanni Pacini's "Developing a Team Philosophy."

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