So Andy Murray’s quest for that first elusive Grand Slam continues. A very winnable third round encounter at Flushing Meadows with Stanislas Wawrinka ends in defeat. Murray looks both frustrated and bemused at his press conference. Frustrated in defeat, but bemused as to why his game has let him down, when he needed it the most. With each defeat, Murrays ability to claim a Grand Slam diminshes. For he becomes ‘beatable’. That is, his opponents know that if they proble long and hard enough, they will find chinks in his armour. Either technical chinks, or mental ones. And the mental […]
Read More...Sports Psychology Blog
Welcome to the Sports Psychology blog. Here you will find insights on current sporting events, from the perspective of a sports psychologist.
The purpose of this blog, is to get inside the sporting drama…why the player or team do what they they do…their thinking…mindsets…attitudes…their fluctuating state of confidence…and all the other mental and emotional pieces that create the psychology of sports.
The most recent articles are at the top of the List Of Sports Psychology Blogs Index.
Football Psychology – The Sacking Of Alan Pardew
It’s four games into the League One season. Southampton have just recorded their first win of the season, smashing Bristol Rovers by four goals to nil, at The Memorial Ground. The Saints are up and running, and ready to build on last seasons excellent effort to overturn a massive points deduction. Then, out of the blue, manager Alan Pardew is sacked. Unless there has been shenanigans behind the scenes, this is a bizarre decision. Last seasons results, clearly indicate that Pardew has what it takes to take the Saints to promotion. He is steeped in the know-how of building a […]
Read More...Football Psychology – The Psychological Problems Of West Ham United!
‘This team carried a lot of psychological problems’. The words of West Ham United manager Avram Grant, after his teams edgy win over League Two’s Oxford United in the Carling Cup. What is Avram talking about? This is a team who, over the last year has forgotten how to win. Therefore, the players expect things to go wrong. And they do! There are not enough leaders in the team to overcome challenges. West Ham United now tend to sign players from overseas. Do these players speak good English? If not, are they given a timescale by which they have to? […]
Read More...Cricket Psychology – Who Picks The Leicester Team?
There is nothing more fascinating for the sporting public, than a row to break-out from within a teams dressing room. Where matters that should be private and confidential, enter the public domain. In this case, its the Leicester CCC captain Matthew Hoggard and coach Tim Boon, in a spat with county chairman Neil Davidson. Davidson has apparently, been interfering in team affairs. Hoggard and Boon want him to stand down. The chairman cites poor results as a valid reason for his concern re team selection. It’s a mess. There is no unity, collectivity or mutuality on display at Grace(less) Rd. […]
Read More...Cricket Psychology – The Mystery Of Kevin Pietersen
Its the penultimate round of County Championship matches. Glamorgan are on the verge of promotion back to Division One. A win at Surrey may secure their elevation. But in the Surrey ranks, making his debut, is Kevin Pietersen. Dropped from the England 20/20 squad, Pietersen has been asked to return to the county ranks to discover his form. But how has it come to this? Pietersen is a hugely talented and gifted individual. He is capable of taking any bowling attack apart, at any level. But with huge talent, comes arrogance. A total and utter belief in ones own abilities. […]
Read More...Cricket Psychology – Alastair Cook & The Trigger Movements
So another failure for Alastair Cook in the test series against Pakistan. The debate around the England opener, has centred around Cook’s trigger movements. A batsman’s trigger movements are designed to help him both get in position, and then react to the ball. But trigger movements are meant to provide stability, like a golfer and their pre-shot routine. They give a sense of security to the batsman. It means that they do the same thing, each time to each ball. But they are not essential. If Alastair Cook is having to think about, or remember his trigger movements when he […]
Read More...Football Psychology – Keigan Parker And The Unfulfilled Talent
It’s tuesday night at Fleetwood Town football club. The small fishing town now have a team in the Conference, one division outside the Football League. A fantastic achievement. Tonight they are hosting Mansfield Town, who only recently were in a League Two play-off final. And up-front for Mansfield, is a small pacy striker, who in 2007 scored one of the goals of the season. In the year Blackpool went up from League One to The Championship, Keigan Parker scored a memorable winner in the play-off final against Yeovil. Chipping the ball deftly past Steve Mildenhall from 25 yards, Parker was […]
Read More...Football Psychology – Nicolas Anelka & The Eighteen Match Ban
So after the fiasco of the failed World Cup campaign, the French Football Federation have come down hard on one of the main perpetrators of the French self-sabotage, by banning Nicolas Anelka for eighteen games. This effectively means that Anelka will not represent his country again. But more importantly, it allows a critical re-evaluation to begin. A re-evaluation around the core values of French football. Values which had clearly become forgotten, as weak man-management and rampant egos held sway, over what it meant to represent the French nation at football. Sometimes it can be good to hit rock-bottom. Reach a […]
Read More...Football Psychology – Blackpool & The X Factor!
The pundits had written Blackpool off. Dismissed them out of hand. Lowest points ever. Relegated by January said ‘expert’ Piers Morgan. And when you look at the evidence its easy to make these arguments. This is a team that has previously shown no real obvious ambition to be a Premier League team. That is in terms of infra-structure, player recruitment, wages and so on. So its easy for the pundits to dismiss Blackpool as a lower league team, trying to punch way above their weight. But that opinion, does not take into account what Blackpool have going for them. And […]
Read More...Sports Psychology: Cycling In Adversity
David Millar was the last Briton to wear the leader’s yellow jersey in 2000. He finished Monday’s ninth stage in 181st place, 42 minutes 45 seconds behind winner Sandy Casar, after a day plagued by a stomach problem and back spasms. “Today represents a brand new entry into my top five worst-ever days on a bike,” the Team Garmin-Transitions rider said. “I spent 180 km by myself convinced I was going to abandon or be eliminated. At 100 km to go I was 30 minutes down on the leaders. “All I could see in my head were the contours of […]
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