Players' Mindset - Reasons behind failures and successes
Mar 29, 2015 11:12:45 GMT
Post by Nemanja79 on Mar 29, 2015 11:12:45 GMT
Depression in football - special report: PFA want to stop another Clarke Carlisle or Gary Speed situation
PFA's welfare unit takes between 15-20 calls a week concerning mental illness and well-being problems
Michael Bennett’s phone bleeps. It is 7pm on a Sunday and he reads a brief email. It is from a footballer. “He said he had not been able to see his son and that he had tried to commit suicide,” Bennett explains.
“I immediately emailed him back and said: ‘I’m Michael Bennett, player welfare at the PFA, email me your number and I will call you straight away.’ Thankfully he called me and we had a conversation. It took a lot of courage for him to send that email. When I get that kind of email coming through I don’t panic I just get to the person as quickly as I can.”
Carlisle 'feels blessed' following recovery from suicide attempt
That former player is now receiving support and counselling through the Professional Footballers’ Association’s welfare programme which is headed by Bennett, a former midfielder with Charlton Athletic, among other clubs, whose own career was blighted by injury, and who now receives 15-25 calls a week from players and former players suffering from mental health and well-being issues.
A high-profile case to emerge recently was that of Clarke Carlisle, the former chairman of the PFA who attempted to take his own life in December when he was hit by a lorry.
Bennett says it was the suicide of Gary Speed in November 2011 that started to heighten awareness among footballers. “We had launched the Mental Health footballers’ guidebook which looks at mental health and well-being and is presented in a ‘Roy of the Rovers’ format,” Bennett says.
“We then had the Gary Speed situation and we received an avalanche of phone calls from players, former and current, wanting to talk about their experiences. In that period I think I saw 57 players. I realised that what I always thought was needed I was seeing and that led to the welfare department at the PFA being formed in February 2012.
“I could not solely go around the country seeing all the players so we teamed up with the Sporting Chance counsellors, whom we had been working with for 12 years, and added them to the network.
“We have 52 counsellors nationwide, including five former players, and it’s growing. We are trying to break the barriers down but there is still a mindset of ‘We can’t show weaknesses’. But we are saying to the players – if you pull a hamstring or twist an ankle the first thing you do is go to a physio’. So if have an issue you also need to speak to someone.”
In all, 197 former and current players have used the service. “What tends to happen is that they will come in and say, for example, that they have financial problems. But it is not usually the root issue – it could be gambling, drinking, a marriage break-up – but it might all point back to a mental health problem,” Bennett says.
So attuned is he that Bennett can spot a player who is struggling out on the pitch. “You can look at games and think ‘He doesn’t want to be out there’,” he says. “A lot of young players I have seen recently just don’t want to play football. They have just had enough. Pressure? Maybe. Family pressure, club pressure. I get a call and a club says ‘We’ve got a player with this problem or that, anger issues’ and it’s something else. I went to a club recently and I sat down and looked at the guy and said: ‘Do you want to play football?’ I’m probably the first person to ask him that and his answer was ‘No’.”
Bennett’s own story is instructive. “I’m sitting here now because of an experience I went through playing against QPR,” he says. “I had just come back from an England under-20s tour to Brazil and there was a lot of newspaper talk about me getting a big move. We kicked off and the ball came out to me. It wasn’t the best touch, it wasn’t the worst touch but it gave the opposing player the chance to come and take everything, which he did, and unfortunately my knee was in the middle of that.
“I was told I’d be out for six weeks but that turned into nine months. I had ruptured my anterior cruciate and my cartilage had been crushed. I think now they would call it reconstructing the knee but at that time, 1991, it was career-threatening. It was also the first injury I had had.
“I wanted to talk about how I felt. I wanted to be able to talk about my worries – ‘Will I be as fast as I used to be, I feel crap today’. I had just bought a flat – would it affect the mortgage? But it wasn’t there for me. I think that’s where the seed was sown.”
Bennett, the player, never really recovered. “My career was a roller-coaster,” he says. “I think I recovered physically but I don’t think I recovered mentally. I always thought the next tackle might finish my career. I was going into matches thinking too much, basically. That really impacted upon me. I ended up finishing at 29 and I fell out of love with the game.”
Bennett is not seeking sympathy for footballers but says that it is time the stress and the scrutiny in the modern game – not least with the explosion of social media – are managed better.
“Football matches are a roller‑coaster,” the 45-year-old says. “Bad pass, your head goes. Missed chance, your head goes. Score a goal, the adulation is up. If you lose a game on a Saturday afternoon you have the whole weekend to struggle along with how you are feeling and that’s an issue in itself.
“But because the game is so big now and there is so much pressure to stay in the Premier League then the clubs will do whatever. Players are chopped and changed and emotionally they can be all over the place.
“The difference is that they have been or are in this bubble but I keep going back to it: they are just people who happen to play football. We tend to look at the footballer and not the person. I can look at the person.
“They are just normal people. You have the guys who earn vast amounts of money and that’s more difficult for them, in a sense, because a lot more is required from them. But as a person they are just like everyone else.”
For players lower down the leagues there are other issues. “You must remember the money is in the Premier League,” Bennett says. “For most players they still have to work after they leave the game and it’s a short career. The average age of a football career now is just seven years. You could be out of the game at 26, 27.”
Former players also have to deal with changes in their lifestyles which can have catastrophic consequences.
“Within three years of leaving the game 75 per cent are divorced,” Bennett says. “A player leaves the game and his identity has kind of gone, his self‑esteem is low, the adulation that he is used to having – autographs, pictures, his name being chanted – that’s gone.
“And he’s fatter. Image is a big thing as well for players. He’s no longer that lean machine but is able to eat and drink things he could not while he was playing and his image suffers.
“We can’t take footballers out of the bubble they live in. But we can educate them and the clubs.”
PFA's welfare unit takes between 15-20 calls a week concerning mental illness and well-being problems
Michael Bennett’s phone bleeps. It is 7pm on a Sunday and he reads a brief email. It is from a footballer. “He said he had not been able to see his son and that he had tried to commit suicide,” Bennett explains.
“I immediately emailed him back and said: ‘I’m Michael Bennett, player welfare at the PFA, email me your number and I will call you straight away.’ Thankfully he called me and we had a conversation. It took a lot of courage for him to send that email. When I get that kind of email coming through I don’t panic I just get to the person as quickly as I can.”
Carlisle 'feels blessed' following recovery from suicide attempt
That former player is now receiving support and counselling through the Professional Footballers’ Association’s welfare programme which is headed by Bennett, a former midfielder with Charlton Athletic, among other clubs, whose own career was blighted by injury, and who now receives 15-25 calls a week from players and former players suffering from mental health and well-being issues.
A high-profile case to emerge recently was that of Clarke Carlisle, the former chairman of the PFA who attempted to take his own life in December when he was hit by a lorry.
Bennett says it was the suicide of Gary Speed in November 2011 that started to heighten awareness among footballers. “We had launched the Mental Health footballers’ guidebook which looks at mental health and well-being and is presented in a ‘Roy of the Rovers’ format,” Bennett says.
“We then had the Gary Speed situation and we received an avalanche of phone calls from players, former and current, wanting to talk about their experiences. In that period I think I saw 57 players. I realised that what I always thought was needed I was seeing and that led to the welfare department at the PFA being formed in February 2012.
“I could not solely go around the country seeing all the players so we teamed up with the Sporting Chance counsellors, whom we had been working with for 12 years, and added them to the network.
“We have 52 counsellors nationwide, including five former players, and it’s growing. We are trying to break the barriers down but there is still a mindset of ‘We can’t show weaknesses’. But we are saying to the players – if you pull a hamstring or twist an ankle the first thing you do is go to a physio’. So if have an issue you also need to speak to someone.”
In all, 197 former and current players have used the service. “What tends to happen is that they will come in and say, for example, that they have financial problems. But it is not usually the root issue – it could be gambling, drinking, a marriage break-up – but it might all point back to a mental health problem,” Bennett says.
So attuned is he that Bennett can spot a player who is struggling out on the pitch. “You can look at games and think ‘He doesn’t want to be out there’,” he says. “A lot of young players I have seen recently just don’t want to play football. They have just had enough. Pressure? Maybe. Family pressure, club pressure. I get a call and a club says ‘We’ve got a player with this problem or that, anger issues’ and it’s something else. I went to a club recently and I sat down and looked at the guy and said: ‘Do you want to play football?’ I’m probably the first person to ask him that and his answer was ‘No’.”
Bennett’s own story is instructive. “I’m sitting here now because of an experience I went through playing against QPR,” he says. “I had just come back from an England under-20s tour to Brazil and there was a lot of newspaper talk about me getting a big move. We kicked off and the ball came out to me. It wasn’t the best touch, it wasn’t the worst touch but it gave the opposing player the chance to come and take everything, which he did, and unfortunately my knee was in the middle of that.
“I was told I’d be out for six weeks but that turned into nine months. I had ruptured my anterior cruciate and my cartilage had been crushed. I think now they would call it reconstructing the knee but at that time, 1991, it was career-threatening. It was also the first injury I had had.
“I wanted to talk about how I felt. I wanted to be able to talk about my worries – ‘Will I be as fast as I used to be, I feel crap today’. I had just bought a flat – would it affect the mortgage? But it wasn’t there for me. I think that’s where the seed was sown.”
Bennett, the player, never really recovered. “My career was a roller-coaster,” he says. “I think I recovered physically but I don’t think I recovered mentally. I always thought the next tackle might finish my career. I was going into matches thinking too much, basically. That really impacted upon me. I ended up finishing at 29 and I fell out of love with the game.”
Bennett is not seeking sympathy for footballers but says that it is time the stress and the scrutiny in the modern game – not least with the explosion of social media – are managed better.
“Football matches are a roller‑coaster,” the 45-year-old says. “Bad pass, your head goes. Missed chance, your head goes. Score a goal, the adulation is up. If you lose a game on a Saturday afternoon you have the whole weekend to struggle along with how you are feeling and that’s an issue in itself.
“But because the game is so big now and there is so much pressure to stay in the Premier League then the clubs will do whatever. Players are chopped and changed and emotionally they can be all over the place.
“The difference is that they have been or are in this bubble but I keep going back to it: they are just people who happen to play football. We tend to look at the footballer and not the person. I can look at the person.
“They are just normal people. You have the guys who earn vast amounts of money and that’s more difficult for them, in a sense, because a lot more is required from them. But as a person they are just like everyone else.”
For players lower down the leagues there are other issues. “You must remember the money is in the Premier League,” Bennett says. “For most players they still have to work after they leave the game and it’s a short career. The average age of a football career now is just seven years. You could be out of the game at 26, 27.”
Former players also have to deal with changes in their lifestyles which can have catastrophic consequences.
“Within three years of leaving the game 75 per cent are divorced,” Bennett says. “A player leaves the game and his identity has kind of gone, his self‑esteem is low, the adulation that he is used to having – autographs, pictures, his name being chanted – that’s gone.
“And he’s fatter. Image is a big thing as well for players. He’s no longer that lean machine but is able to eat and drink things he could not while he was playing and his image suffers.
“We can’t take footballers out of the bubble they live in. But we can educate them and the clubs.”
An average football fan wants his team to perform the best possible which is normally and goes without saying, but that same fan doesn't have an insight in what's happening in personal lives of members of their team and more often than not doesn't take into consideration a possible issues that player could have regarding that. There's always talk how the new player for example needs to settle, to get used to a new environment, new club, new manager and new ways of preparations and in foreign players' case, the new country and culture. All of this requires some time, more or less, dependable on players mindset - weaknesses and strengths.
Players get criticized if they under perform and if that lasts for too long, the usual reasons being mentioned are "failed to settle in", "not physically strong enough", "doesn't fit in the system", "doesn't work hard on the pitch" and many other reasons for failures, but very rarely people will try to go deeper into the problem, not to find an excuse for a bad displays but to try to discover the real source of the problem.
After all, it all comes from the head of the individual, his personal mindset. I believe when scouts looking at some potential buy, first thing that they need to learn is about player's mentality and his strengths and weaknesses on that field. I could be wrong but this way sounds very logical.
We've heard from our manager that certain players are not so much open for a talk about their internal state to say like that for many reasons. First thing that needs to be done here is to start from there and find out what are the reasons for them not to be open for a talk and it requires a certain level of expertise, not just wait for them to become open for cooperation eventually. I really do wonder in how many cases it's done this way when you look at failures of the players in a given club/country and their seeking for exit as the easier path.
Lets take di Maria and Falcao for example and in previous case, Nani, the three of the very finest of their kind. The latter and the middle are considered more or less as failures, depends from which point of view you observe it.
The article above is showing two extreme cases but I wonder how many of them are walking around with some sort of mental issues on a different levels and in how many cases are experts (psychologists, psychiatrists etc) are involved in curing the core and source of all failures, the brain. What techniques are used to help those who struggle and how persistent the clubs are regarding this? What needs to be done to prevent players from creating a shell around them and do not want (or are scared) to get out of it?
