What does it take to have the skill to win?
By: Fernando Valenzuela
Winning is about choice. Winning is a matter of decisions and actions taken to achieve a positive outcome.
The best players understand how game play is a good indicator of the team’s chance of victory in the match.
Strategies and tactics do work on the challenges of the game, and still, there is a need for holistic intent.
In this article, we learn about the Development Process that creates the habits and routines that lead to excellent player actions. Practice is what develops the winning skill and style that we love to see in the beautiful game.
Opportunities that arise during Game Play
Let’s start by taking another look at the soccer experience. We’ve used open match play as a framing to understand the flow of the game. In this article, Game Play is characterized as the ongoing contest for initiative.
Initiative is the momentary ability to set the terms of play. Players often take, lose, and reclaim the initiative. This is important because it means that soccer is a game of limited control and contested initiative (1).
Pro Tip
Most player actions are performed with the intent to impact (2) the match outcome. Here’s a list of the types of impact:
Offensive contribution: increases the chance of scoring.
Defensive contribution: decreases the chance of conceding.
The value of an action depends on the change in probability for both scoring and conceding given a change in game state.
Measuring the contributions that players make, building player style profiles, and finding the best fit for a team’s style of play will be discussed in a future article.
Foundations, progression, and Preparation
Every player knows what it feels like to compete. We know that not all gameplay moments are the same. Some are much more difficult than others, and demand higher levels of performance.
Those rare moments of high-risk action decide match outcomes.
With that in mind, players need to know how to move along the path of high performance. Here development becomes relevant, to reach the highest level of skill.
Essentially, the Development Process is the way for players to gain the capacity for excellence.
For the way to advance, players must achieve 4 developments:
Foundation: competent and expected action.
Instinct: smart and emergent play.
Trust: creative and risky football.
Flow: rare and beautiful intuition.
The master challenge is to convert flow state (3) action into the decisive moments of the match.
To transcend that challenge, players must be ready to take on the risk of the beautiful game.
Trust in the team Identity
Outcomes are decided at the margins.
Most teams aim to reach decisive moments through stability and control, not chaos.
Generally, this means that while most actions in a match are precise and repeatable, teams must set the stage for high-risk expressive play.
Here, a team’s chemistry is built, and another feature of development comes into play.
The Team Development Process is the ongoing synthesis of a team’s high performance identity.
A team improves across 5 traits:
Structure: formation and tactical rigidity.
Tempo: speed of ball and player movement.
Chaos: willingness to disrupt or embrace disorder.
Freedom: frequency of creative moments.
Trust: instinctive team cohesion.
The challenge at this point is to refine a successful game model (4) that supports player actions.
To be the best, teams must create an environment that nurtures high performance.
The Will to Succeed
In this article, we looked at the high performance that arises during game play. We also explored the Team Development Process as the way to reach the highest level of skill.
But we still have to consider one more element. One that makes development possible and embodies the skill to win.
That element is the propensity of individual players.
Each player has unique abilities, goals, and tendencies. Most importantly, each player has a unique capacity(5) to attack and defend. A great coach understands this capacity. She knows how much her players will compete. She knows how much can be achieved.
Still, players must be entrusted to perform valuable developmental work. Each must own her skill as best she can, honestly, to unlock the full potential of the team.
The main idea, for the squad to improve as a unit, is to be willing to be excellent.
In the end, the way to win is to focus on development. For development to be true, it must be creative, resilient, and unique.
Notes
Dominant teams rarely control more than 65% of possession over 90 minutes.
Decroos, T. et al. Actions Speak Louder than Goals: Valuing Player Actions in Soccer. (2019).
A mental state of flow is a moment of intense absorption where performance can surpass even its usual high level.
Casal, C. et al. Possession Zone as a Performance Indicator in Football. The Game of the Best Teams. Front. Psychol. 8:1176 (2017).
Agonistic capacity refers to how well a player can engage in a competitive struggle, drawing on her tactical, physical, and emotional skills.
