 One of the biggest problems players have is playing well consistently. Maybe you have one good game every once in a while, but wouldn't you like to have a good game every time you step on the field? What I've done for you is created a five-step system, and I promise if you follow these five steps, you actually do these five things every time you play. You will be a much more consistent player. You will play with more confidence. You'll play to your potential. You won't feel like, I should have done more. I could have done more. I know I can do more. Why can't I just make it happen on game day? If you follow these five things I'm about to share with you, you will have much more success on the field, and you will be way more consistent. If you don't know about me, I used to be a huge underachiever. But through obsessive self-improvement, I found my success. Earned a college scholarship, played for my national football team, a YouTube channel with over 100 million views. I've helped players worldwide, and I'd love to help you improve faster and achieve more. First and foremost, before anything else, if you do not follow this one step, if you can't figure this out, everything else I'm about to share with you does not matter. This is where it all starts, and this is what makes everything possible. Before you go out there on the field, you must actually believe in your ability to succeed. Sadly, most players go out on the field, and they do not believe in themselves. Instead of thinking about succeeding or the excitement of winning, they're thinking about screwing up. They're thinking about failing. They're thinking about letting their coach and their teammates down. They're thinking about everything that could possibly go wrong. And I say this in a lot of my videos, especially the mental ones. The thoughts in your mind produce the actions on the field. So if you're thinking negative thoughts, you're thinking everything that's going to go wrong, this competition is too much for me. What if my coach yells at me? What if we get scored on? What if no one passes to me? What if, what if, what if? What if everything goes wrong? You're setting yourself up for failure, okay? So change your mindset. You have to be positive. Right now, you may have negative thoughts in your mind, but understand me. You can start controlling those thoughts, and you can change those thoughts. And in fact, it's your absolute responsibility to do that. If you do not do that, you are set up to fail from the very beginning. So instead of being negative, be positive. Start thinking about everything that you're going to do well. Start thinking about everything that's going to happen for you. And get excited. Get excited about winning the game. Get excited about playing well. Get excited about impressing your teammates. Get excited about scoring goals, making tackles, making assists. Get excited about making an impact. If you can go into the game with the mindset of excitement, I'm excited to play because of the potential of so many good things could happen as opposed to being afraid. I'm afraid to go in this game. I'm nervous. I'm scared because everything could possibly go wrong. If you can change that from fear to excitement, and from negativity to positivity, then you're setting yourself up for success. So number one, you have to actually believe in your ability to succeed. And be very honest with yourself. If you do not handle this step, you go into the game, and you're still negative in your mind. You're still afraid in your mind. You can rationalize to yourself why you should be excited and why you should be positive. Then you're set up to fail from the very beginning. Step number two on my formula for playing consistently well is bring the work rate. Bring the work rate and bring the energy. I was having a chat with a player the other day and we were talking about how it seems the players with the most skill always feel like they don't have to work as hard as everyone else. And that is so sad, but that is what happens every day. I see this all the time. Players with great skill are wasting their potential because they don't want to work hard. In fact, those same players are getting beaten by players with much less skill, but players who have decided to work hard every time they step on the field is just part of who they are. So if you want to make a bigger impact on the game, you need to work harder. If you want to play well consistently, you need to work harder. Sometimes your touch isn't going to be on. You may make bad passes. You may make mistakes. You may miss your chances. But if you always decide to work hard, no matter what happens, you're going to have a positive impact. If you like this content, check out the Soccer Success Planner. You can download it for free. There's a link in the description below. And for advanced training, check out the Online Soccer Academy. You're going to have a positive impact on the game. So whatever happens, if your team is losing 10-0 or you're winning 10-0, keep going. Work hard. Play the same way you always would. Why? You're going to get more out of that game. Even if your team is winning 10-0, like I said, keep going hard. Keep playing hard. You're going to get fitness out of that game. You're going to get experience out of that game. Maybe you can get some more goals for yourself. Maybe you can help your teammates get more goals and get their confidence up. Maybe you can keep a clean sheet. So there's always something to gain. Never give up on the game. Always work as hard as you can. On top of that, you never know who might be watching. If your team is losing 10-0 and everyone on the other team or everyone on your team has already given up and you're the player who's still working for their personal pride, but also for your personal game to become a better player. And it's just part of who you are. You never know who might be watching and you might impress someone very important. So never give up. Always bring that work rate. Always bring that energy. If you want to be more involved in the play, players are always coming to me saying, hey, I'm not involved enough. My teammates don't pass me the ball. Only if my teammates could pass me the ball or my coach would play me in a different position, I'd be more involved. That's not your problem. Your problem is you're not working hard enough. If you want to be more involved, work harder. Bring more energy to your game. Run more. Put more effort into chasing players down, winning the ball back. It's not all about just getting on the ball and making nice passes. Sometimes it's about grinding. It's about putting in that hard dirty work that most players don't want to do. And if you do that more often, you'll get more involved in the play. Defensively closing players down. Don't give them any time to play. Make their life a living hell. If you know you should be back in position, you have to track back. Don't do what most players do and just jog back. Sprint there as fast as you can or as fast as you need to to make sure your position is covered and you're going to help your team out defensively. If you want to score goals, be more active with your off the ball movement, making forward runs, making runs to support the ball, getting involved in the play. So if you want to play well consistently, bring the work rate and add more energy to your game. My third key for success and playing consistently well is all about what you do on the ball and you must play with tempo, speed of play, and quick decision making is what will make you effective when you have the ball at your feet. Okay, the worst thing you can do is take too long to make a decision. Because what happens, let's say you're the central midfielder here wherever you're playing and you get on the ball and you take your sweet time, you take so long to make a decision, you just ruin it for everyone else. It's so frustrating to play with the player who gets the ball, takes 10 touches, but goes nowhere. You do not want to be that player. It's much better for you to get the ball, give the ball, get the ball, give the ball, get the ball, give the ball, get the ball, give the ball. Why? It forces the other team to move. They have to chase that ball around the field and when they do, it's going to create gaps for other players on your team to play. So if you're receiving the ball and you're taking 10 seconds, five seconds even, to make a decision, it's too slow. When you're on the ball, I want you to think about two things. You're either moving the ball quickly, so that's get the ball, open up, pass it, then move into space. Or if you have space, you're moving quickly with the ball. So it's okay to take touches, but there has to be intention and purpose with those touches. So let's say I get the ball out here. I'm not going to take 10 seconds and 10 touches and go nowhere and let everyone close me down. As soon as I get that ball, before I get that ball, I know what I want to do. My intention, my purpose is to play quickly, play with tempo. Okay, so these guys are doing their job. They're moving the ball quickly, moving the ball quickly, moving the ball quickly. It gets to you, you have space, now you move with the ball quickly. Okay, you're dribbling, but there's speed, there's purpose, there's purpose to your movement and your intention. Okay, so you're playing with urgency. The only time you shouldn't be playing with urgency, like very direct. I'm not saying play rushed, but I'm saying play direct. Go for goals, try to get in the opposition's third. The only time you shouldn't be doing that is if you're trying to kill the game off. Okay, let's say your team is winning 2-0 and instead of always trying to go forward, we want to try to go forward, but reality, we want to keep possession of the ball. Okay, there, you're not playing with as much urgency, but you're still moving the ball quickly. Okay, so think about making quicker decisions. How do you make quicker decisions? Try to know where you're going to pass before it gets to you. Now let's say you're this player. Most players, average players in this position, the ball is coming to them. They're not thinking about anything else. They're not thinking about where I'm going to move the ball next. All they're thinking about is this ball coming to them and receiving it. Then they get the ball, then they take their touch, then they put their head up, then they make their pass. By that time, it's taken too long. Even if you do get that ball there and no one intercepts it, it's taken way too long. It's allowed their whole team to shift and get behind the ball. Okay, so in reality, you need to know where that ball is going before you get it. Say that ball is played to you. You already know it's going there. You don't even have to take a touch. You just ping it there first time, okay? You got your head up. You're looking around. You're making your decisions before the ball is played there. Now, if you are a smart player, you're not just going to pass that ball blindly because you know that's where it should go, okay? If that ball is coming to you, you're analyzing, analyzing. Oh, maybe that's not on. Boom, I'll play this pass instead. Okay, but think about tempo, guys. It's all about speed of play. Can you play more one touch? Can you play more two-touch football? When you are on the ball and you are dribbling, are you doing it quickly with purpose playing very direct? If you can play with tempo every time you're on the field, you're going to be a much more successful player and you're going to play well much more consistently. My fourth step to success and playing well every time you're on the field and this one is so important is about concentration or focus on your positioning. What do you do when you don't have the ball at your feet? Okay, guess what? 90% of the game, you're not going to have the ball. If you like this content, check out the Soccer Success Planner. You can download it for free. There's a link in the description below. And for advanced training, check out the Online Soccer Academy. You're not going to have the ball at your feet. Maybe even more. I don't know the exact statistic, but what do you do when you don't have the ball? You need to focus on your positioning. So let's get organized here. We'll be the red team. Okay, focus on your positioning. Where should you be? That's what you should always be asking yourself. In this situation, where should I be? And if you get in the habit of asking yourself, where should I be? I need to get there right away. Then you're going to be a much better player. Okay, and for most players, you don't start figuring this out until you get older. Why? Older players are usually really good at positioning because they don't have the energy to run around everywhere. So they just say, hey, I have to be really smart with my positioning. I have to put myself in the right situations. So I don't have to run as much. I can read the play better. And I can be more involved by doing less. And if you can adopt that mindset at a young age, obviously you're still going to add that energy. You're still going to add that work rate that we talked about. But now you're being smart with your movement. You're getting in the right positions. You're going to be such an effective player. Okay, so where should you be when the other team has the ball? Let's say in this situation, first man, closest man to the ball, I want you to press. Everyone else covers. Okay, so where should I be? Let's say, for example, this guy goes to press and we're all over here. Where should we be? We got to get covering. I know I have to get across. I know I have to come in here to cut this pass. I know I have to come in here to help. Okay, where should you be? The thing is most players, they just ball watch when we don't have possession. They're not actually thinking, where is the most beneficial position for my team that I should be in right now? All they're doing is just watching the ball. And they're saying, oh, you guys, you guys can handle it, right? No, don't give them time to hurt you. Don't let them get into here and then say, oh, now we should be back here. Okay, focus on your positioning. Where should you be? Every opportunity when you don't have the ball. Okay, if I'm up here, let's say we're like this and they're attacking us. Where should I be? I know I should be back here. So don't jog back there and say, oh, Johnny's got it. He's a good defender. No, get back. Okay, get in there as quickly as you can. Don't jog back. Sprint back. You know you should be there. Get there. You know you should be covering. Get there. You know you should be covering this guy's run. We'll get there. Okay, so when you don't have the ball, I want you to ask yourself more often, where should I be? Where is the best position for me to be? One other thing on ball watching, okay? So most players, let's say for example, this guy has the ball. We're just ball watching. This guy's making a run. This guy's making a run. And we're all just slowly like coming towards this ball or just watching this ball. And we're not thinking about the dangers of other players. So you want to always keep one eye on the ball and one eye on the player who is closest to you that might be dangerous and you should be marking. Okay, so yes, we do want to close these gaps and we do want to come closer to the ball. First man closes the ball. Next guy covers the pass, potential pass. Next guy, we're coming in to cover potential passes in here. He knows that this guy might get the ball, okay? So your positioning isn't always directly related to the ball. It's in fact the player that this guy might get the ball to, okay? So I have more videos about this on my channel and positioning especially for specific positions. Go to my channel and search for your position. You'll get a full tutorial on your position, where you should be on the ball, where you should be off the ball. But for now, just start asking yourself, where should I be? Who do I need to be marking? Where is the ball? And where do I need to be in relation to those two things? Am I there? I need to get there right away. And if you can do that, you're going to be much more effective defensively. You're going to help your team out a lot more. You're going to make more interceptions. You're going to be more involved in the play because you'll be able to read the play and react quicker than everyone else. The key to playing well consistently is react positively. Whatever happens on the field, you need to react positively. When things go bad, sadly, most players act negatively. The thing is you can always control how you respond to whatever happens. Not only on the field, but whatever happens in your life. You have the choice to make a positive reaction. So if you want to play well consistently, you need to react positively when things go wrong. So let's take a look at a couple examples. First of all, how do you react when you make mistakes? Let's say you have a bad touch. You miss a scoring opportunity. You give away possession and the other team scores. How do you react after that happens? Does your head go down? You start talking negatively to yourself to say, oh, why would I do that? I'm so stupid. I suck. Okay. How does your play change? Do you just kick the ball away? Or do you hide in the play now because you don't want to have the ball on your feet? How do you react when you make mistakes? Instead of doing that, you need to pick your head up. You need to say, hey, that's not who I am. Yes, I made a mistake, but I'm going to learn from that mistake and I'm going to make a difference in this game. If I resulted in my team conceding, I made a mistake and my team got scored on. Well, guess what? I'm going to do something to score some goals on the other side, or I'm going to make sure that that never happens again during this game. How do you react? Do you pick your head up and do you believe in yourself in your ability to come back from that mistake? Or do you do what most people do and start hiding? Start losing their confidence. Start going down and down and body language is horrible. Okay. As soon as you make a mistake, try to get that ball back and get on the ball and make something happen. Play your way back into the game. How do you respond after you make mistakes? How do you respond after setbacks? So let's say your team gets scored against or the referee makes a bad call and gives the other team a penalty. Okay. How do you respond when there's setbacks against you or your team? Most people get frustrated, pissed off. They start blaming other people. They start pointing at others and passing the blame. They start making excuses. They start giving up. If you like this content, check out the Soccer Success Planner. You can download it for free. There's a link in the description below. And for advanced training, check out the Online Soccer Academy. Start giving up. They started not playing as hard. They say, oh, everyone's against us. There's nothing we can do. The ref is against us. Okay. That's total BS. How do you react? You can't change the past. All you can do is focus on the future. So when things go against you, when there's setbacks against you or setbacks against your team, you can't control the past. All you can do is focus on the future. Do whatever you can to influence the rest of the game. Okay. If you're down 3-1, that doesn't matter. You can still come back and win 4-3. But only if you have that mindset and only if you react positively. And guess what? If you react positively to negative situations, you're going to affect the people around you. You're going to affect your teammates in a positive way. How do you respond when other people are involved? Let's say, for example, your teammates start yelling at you whenever you make a mistake or your coach gets really frustrated with you when you do something wrong on the field or maybe a player on the other team is trying to get in your head and tells you, you suck. Why do you even play soccer and trying to get you off your game? How do you react to those sorts of situations? Well, before we get into each one specifically, understand that you should not let other people affect your confidence. If you do, you're giving away your control. Your confidence should be totally under your control. If I know I'm a good player inside, right here in my mind, I know personally that I'm a good player. It doesn't matter what you say to me. It doesn't matter what he says to me. It doesn't matter what the media or the press says to me. It doesn't matter what anyone says to me because I believe in myself. That's all that matters. And I need the strength and the ability to block all that out. Okay, so when you make a mistake and your teammates or your coaches start yelling at you, don't let that affect you. Yes, if you made a mistake, analyze it. Say, okay, I did make a mistake there and I need to do something differently the next time. Don't just say, hey, screw you. You always make mistakes and start getting defensive. Okay, that's not going to help anyone. Be humble. Go inside yourself and say, yes, I did make a mistake. I need to be responsible for that and I need to do something differently, but I need to block that out and I can't control the past. I can only control the future. And I need to focus on playing well, okay? So how do you react when other people get involved? They start yelling at you, getting frustrated with you? That doesn't matter. You need to block that out and you need to focus on what you can control and that is being in the moment and doing whatever you can to help your team win the game. And on the topic of opponents trying to get in your head, trying to get you off your game, telling you you suck, you're no good. Why do you even play soccer? Okay, again, you need to block that out. He's trying to do that because he's trying to get under your skin. Probably because you're a good player and he wants to get you off your game, okay? So if you know that, don't even give him the chance to get under your skin. Just laugh at him or smirk at him and then or don't even acknowledge him and just focus on playing your game. When he gets the ball, tackle him really hard, okay? Don't foul him or try to break his legs or anything, but make him screw up and show him that really he's the one that sucks in soccer, okay? Bring that hard work, bring that energy, use that against him and focus on playing your game. Don't get caught up in all that stuff. Just focus on yourself and reacting positively to whatever happens. I just realized I didn't do an outro or a little summary when I was recording that video, but basically if you can honestly do those five things every time you step on the field, you're gonna play well, okay? It's gonna be hard for you not to play well. The real issue here is if you're actually gonna be honest with yourself. So before every game, review those five things and tell yourself to do those five things. When you're in the game, remind yourself to do those five things and after the game, actually review and ask yourself, did I do these five things? Did I play well today? No, well, which one of these five things didn't I do or maybe I didn't do all of them? But if you can start to consistently do those five things, make them part of the player you are, every time you step on the field, you're gonna play well consistently. For myself, I don't really have bad games. Like some games I may not score and obviously I get a little frustrated with that and I try to fix that the next game. But even if I don't score, I'm still making an impact on the game. I'm still doing things defensively for my team. I'm still making things tick. I'm still moving the ball. I'm still playing a central role in the team. So if you can do those five things, I always do those five things and they work for me, I guarantee they're gonna work for you. You just have to be honest with yourself.