By Marcelo Antonelli &
Tania Bandeira
You love to play.
You are a serious and dedicated player.
You train hard on your fitness and abilities.
You try your best in each training session.
But in order to become excellent, you need to train yourself to “crack the code.”
For you to be successful, you have to understand that you are the main one responsible for your success, and to achieve it, in addition to training with dedication, you will have to develop your ability to understand and solve the problems that each training session and game present.
In other words, you will need to become an intelligent and decisive player.
We, as coaches, present a variety of exercises and games to you in training, changing rules, space, number of players, and the position of goals, creating challenges to help you improve.
We can stop the activity and give you “coaching points." Now, GOOD players will hear these training points and respond well.
We can also use a strategy called “guided discovery” by asking some questions about the activity to help guide you in developing the answers. GREAT players will be able to find effective answers to our questions.
But if you want to be EXCELLENT, you will try to “crack the code” before any guidance or help from your coach. You will find the solutions for the activities.
This is a great way for you to practice how to become a smart player, and thus, achieve success on the pitch.
Think about it, during an official game, you will have many challenges and problems to solve (for example, how the other team defends, how they attack, what their best players do, how to adapt to a particular field or weather conditions, etc.).
Coaches love and choose smart players who can solve these problems throughout the course of the game. And if you can not only solve your individual problems but also guide your team to finding solutions, you will really differentiate yourself.
Furthermore, the ability to solve problems is something that can go far beyond sports and help you in all aspects of your life.
Problem-solving intelligence is a trained skill and you can improve it during each training session!
So, will you be content to follow the guidelines or will you train yourself to solve training challenges, “crack the code” in each training session, and work towards becoming an increasingly intelligent and decisive athlete?
About the authors:
Tania Leandra Bandeira has a Bachelor's in Physical Education and Psychology and Master's and Doctorate Degrees in Physical Education with a specialty in Sports Psychology. She has academic experience in higher education and as a sports psychologist and has worked with disabled and conventional athletes in the following sports: swimming, track and field, futsal, soccer, baseball, and tennis. You can follow her @tania.bandeira.psico
Marcelo Antonelli is the creator of "Soccer Powered by Futsal." He has a Bachelor's in Physical Education - Sports Science and a Master's in Education He is a former futsal professional player, has 11 years of coaching experience at the NCAA Division 1 level, and has also coached club and ODP in the USA. You can follow him on Twitter @MarAntonelli1.
Website: soccerpoweredbyfutsal.com
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