Benefits of playing Football – Part 5

One of the first mental benefits of football is the ability it must develop an individual’s concentration skills. Concentration is important for anyone and the earlier someone can develop an understanding of not just what concentration is but also why they need it the better.

So how does football achieve this? Firstly, in the development an individual’s skills in order to play the game and then the playing of the game itself. In order to play football, you need certain skills, first touch, striking the ball, running with the ball are the basics. In order to learn these, you need to be able to focus on how to do them. This might take the form of someone watching a YouTube video, or more likely at a young age someone learning from a coach. If the individual is not concentrating, then they are likely to not understand how to perform the action. Therefore in order to learn new skills players must learn to concentration. Furthermore, the players we see on TV seem to perform actions as second nature and for them it is. But, that’s not how it starts out. You must first become focused and concentrate on doing the move slowly and correctly before attempting to make it difficult by doing it faster or under pressure.

Secondly the game of football requires concentration to play. To be able to focus on the ball, teammates, opposition and where the goals are, takes a lot of concentration. Its one of the main reasons that the game is adjusted to shorter lengths at the younger ages. It is simply too much to ask of young minds to be able to concentrate for the same amount of time as adults. But if a player continues to play for a couple of seasons then they will develop a greater ability to concentrate for longer periods of time. This has a carry over affect into an individual’s life outside of football as well creating better concentration in the classroom or at work.