Insiders View On Goalkeeper Motivation

Across the globe the goalkeeping position is recognised as the toughest on the pitch. There are many reasons the position is known as this, one minute you can be the hero but maybe 10 minutes later you could be the villain.

I recently played a game were I gave away a debatable penalty which was converted and ended in the loss of the game for my team. The comments I received from the Manager and Assistant Manager made me feel better about the result.

They stated, “The position you play is the toughest place to play in the game of football, you save your team or you can lose the game. The penalty may have had some bearing on us losing the game but remember last week, you kept us in the game three times with some excellent saves. And you were rewarded with Man of the Match for your efforts.

Even throughout tonight’s match you made some great saves when we were going looking for a goal and kept us in with a chance of still getting something. We all saw that is wasn’t a penalty and because of that some will remember you for just giving that penalty away tonight. But in our minds we remember the saves you made, the great kicks you made to get us attacking and your great performances and effort you have put in this season”.

This gave me a good boost of confidence as you always see goalkeepers at the top level only remembered for the mistakes they made. But if a goalkeeper does make a mistake or give away a penalty, remind him of how he has done well in other areas of the game.

It certainly made me feel better about my performance and made me respect my management for the excellent support they gave me.

EDITORS NOTE: As you can see with Ryan’s post, goalkeepers have a memory of an elephant! Ryan remembered verbatim what his coach had stated to him about his performance!

Ryan Howells plays as a goalkeeper for Sandhurst Town FC, and owns and runs RH Goalkeeping.com, a live diary of Ryan’s experience as a goalkeeper.