Focused for Soccer

Successful soccer players understand the game, have the skills to execute the techniques and tactics, and are conditioned to meet the physical demands of the sport. A fourth and equally important factor in soccer success is mental toughness. Being a champion requires concentration, discipline, motivation, and a positive attitude.

Now players can learn to meet and overcome the mental challenges of intense competition with Focused for Soccer. This book alone delivers such in-depth, easy-to-follow guidelines for maximizing individual performance on the soccer field.

Focused for Soccer will help you sharpen mental skills and unleash your full potential. Better than general sport psychology text, Focused for Soccer is filled with practical tips and step-by-step techniques that transfer directly to the game. Part of Human Kinetics' popular Focused for Sports series, this book makes the case that physical skills and conditioning must be combined with psychological skills to be a champion.

European coach and sport psychologist Bill Beswick is the world's leading authority on the mental aspects of soccer performance. Beswick's insights and anecdotes enrich the expert instruction throughout the book. He explains how he has applied the training techniques successfully in his many years as a coach and consultant.

Beswick begins by helping you create an honest player assessment and a plan of action. He then guides you through every key factor of the mental game that will improve performance, including positive outlook, intensity of actions, imagination, winning attitudes, healthy competitiveness, and true teamwork. In many sections, the author shows techniques used by professional athletes and sport psychologists to boost performance to a higher level.

Encouraging athletes to play "first with the head, then with the heart," Focused for Soccer is a players' and coaches' guide to all of the psychological tools necessary to become a soccer champion. It is an invaluable tool for improving the foundation of your game and an outstanding guidebook for any physical athletic training program.

Bill Beswick is a leader in the field of applied sport psychology. With a master's of education and a background as the head coach of England's men's basketball team, Bill became the first sport psychology consultant to operate full time in English professional soccer.

Beswick is currently the Consultant Sports Psychologist to Manchester United. Previously, Beswick helped the Derby County Football Club compete successfully in one of the world's toughest soccer leagues—the English Premier League. The English Football Association recognized Beswick's accomplishments there and appointed him as their first-ever sport psychology consultant to advise their national teams.

Beswick is the owner and managing director of SportsMind, a company dedicated to the further development of applied sport psychology in all sports. He is also an active member of the Association for the Advancement of Applied Sports Psychology. Bill currently resides in Cheshire, England, and enjoys keeping fit, reading, traveling, and watching his son play rugby.