Sams's Blog - Proven Way To Improve Your Game

Posted by Hayden at 12:00am, Tuesday 16 March 2021

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Over the course of the season we will be posting a number of blogs by Sam Donaldson a footballer, father and Physiotherapist at the clubs great sponsor RHP Physiotherapy

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Want to improve your game? Play it.

The best way to improve your skills is to practice.

Practice often and with positive intent.

The time spent in training, learning your craft is truly the only way to keep improving.

But have you ever heard about ‘that young prodigy footballer whose career was ruined by injuries’?

The reason they never reached those dizzying heights in the game was because of a number of injuries. Those injuries kept the player away from training for weeks at a time. Add 2 or 3 of these injuries to a season and you can easily miss 3 months of training!

So to get better at your game, don’t miss training!

Consider a case you may know, such as Tom Rogic or Daniel Arzani. Both are players that had been predicted for a massive future in the game. Both, regrettably, have failed to reach the expectations. Don’t misunderstand me, they are both phenomenal players and far better than I could have ever dreamt of myself. But, one wonders how impressive their careers might have progressed had they been able to consistently train.

Injury prevention is like a long-term financial investment strategy. You consistently put some time (or money) into it, and although you can’t predict what the future holds, you can be sure that you’ll be in a far better place in the future for having done it rather than not.

So, what should you do?

There can be a lot of eye catching, ‘sexy’ or interesting programs you can follow, and frankly I’m sure they all have some merit.

In football, the FIFA11+ program is designed to be a warm-up before training sessions or games, that helps prevent injury, and support your footballing development!

At various levels of the game we now know that by performing the FIFA11+ exercises at least 1.5 times per week (or 3 times per fortnight), results in a reduction in injury rate of approximately 35%. This can even be enhanced by doing some added strengthening exercises after training sessions, reducing possibly up to 45% of the number of injuries suffered in a season.

So, if you want to ensure you can stay training and playing, it is well worth your while putting some time aside for strength, balance and movement control exercises designed for your game.

Not only will you personally be able to develop your skills, increasing your chance to play and develop, but you will also be ensuring your team has a better chance of success!

Win, win!