INTRODUCTION

My name is Kevin George, I’m a Facilitator/Clinical Consultant, that qualified as a Counsellor. Ever since I began studying human behaviour, I saw my experiences as a Professional Football Player and the system of football differently. This lead to the birth of Soccology. A service that uses the power of the biggest sport in the world, to provide education on mental health and emotional literacy (visit Soccology services).

PURPOSE OF HUMAN PERFORMANCE SERVICE

Emotions affect our performance as people. To be knowledgable, skilful and composed in challenging situations, sets the foundation to increase our level and consistency of performance. Assessing the emotional ability of others, being able to select friends and spouses that preserve your health, and being vulnerable with people who can offer the support you need, all are reflective of emotional literacy levels. I haven't even delved into how you manage your emotions, the list touches on your ability to construct your social environment.

Our environment affects our state of mind and uses our natural resources. A challenging environment can lead to you to changing from happy to sad. The same environment can have a more resilient version of you, change from happy to stressed, feeling fatigued as a consequence. When our state of mind or emotions “negatively” change, our energy levels change, our health during that time and the quality of our decisions fall. Leading to feud, termination of relationships and social exclusion. Our performance takes a dive.

In football, players like the rest of society experience this. They also have the burden of managing what I refer to as the alternative world. A world where they have another identity, an additional set of experiences, an additional set of laws and consistently placed on trial. This alternative reality is an emotionally furnace. I have seen players over the last two decades self sabotage their careers due to feeling overwhelmed by their emotions.

I feel the work to support the players is important, I also feel that creating awareness about what they need and how those in charge of their environment can better support them, is just as important.

With this being the case, I decided to do a case study with one of the players I have been working with. Gennaro Nigro.

Gennaro is a 20 year old young man who is a Professional Football Player for AS Roma, in Italy. I have facilitated ten, one to one sessions with Gennaro on a weekly basis. With his permission, I chose to write a case study about the process. Confidentiality remains on the details of our sessions, with only the emotional journey shared.

This case study covers -

1. Gennaro’s relationship with his emotions.

2. How his emotions affected his performance

3. The professional relationship between Gennaro and myself.

4. The complexity of the process.

“Football makes me feel alive, gives me purpose, and my love for this game allows me to grow everyday.”

– Gennaro Nigro

OBJECTIVE OF SESSIONS

Gennaro shared the problems he was going through at football. When sharing his experiences, I noticed that he didn’t speak about how he felt. He was going through a tough time, but his focus was on football. With the belief that when his football situation improves, emotionally everything will be okay.

In his circumstance he was right but If Gennaro were to stick with this strategy moving forward, how he feels would be determined by the external world. With him taking up the position of victim when future challenges arise in football and life. A strategy that former Manchester City player Michael Johnson applied, at a more extreme level.

This strategy is common in the world of football, knowingly and unknowingly players seek refuge in performing well and minimising risk on the pitch. Exercising skillful avoidance strategies. Playing football takes you away from off-field problems and when you have problems in football, avoiding risk on the pitch is avoiding also avoiding a problem. Considering football is a game of problem solving, players who consistently avoid risk bring less value to the team.

Both are strategies for avoiding vulnerability.

Gennaro and myself, then agreed that the objective will be for Gennaro to build a stronger relationship with his emotions, so that he will be more resilient to managing external factors. Although the content of what he brought to session was football, the context was emotional and that’s where our focus was. However, in addition to upping his personal performance, his professional performances will improve as a byproduct of his emotional development.

This is the beginning of a new approach for Gennaro.

“Expressing my emotion is foreign, I try to give a short answer to move past it.”

- Gennaro Nigro

AM I DOING THE RIGHT THING?

Once we established Gennaro’s goal, he used the sessions to unload his concerns. Initially I was using a person-centred approach, an approach that would create an environment for Gennaro to understand his situation better and function more effectively within it.

Gennaro was frustrated and confused. Communicating from a logical point of view, reporting on the situation. I learned that Gennaro had been using this pattern throughout his life, when faced with adversity he would suppress emotion and let logic take the lead. We spoke about the history of the habit, and Gennaro shared how it links to his childhood. We then spoke about the possibility of logic suppressing his feelings, the impact on his emotional health and on his performances.

After a couple sessions I began to question whether the person-centred approach was the best fit for Gennaro. Although he was speaking about his experiences, I felt that I needed to change my approach to help him achieve his objective of having a better connection to his feelings. Taking him from taking about his feelings, to talking from his feelings.

The person-centred approach gave Gennaro space to share, but I didn’t believe it was going to help Gennaro to make the strides he was capable of. I began to wonder whether I was using the best modality (clinical method)? Were my doubts about me (progress not quick enough) or were they about Gennaro (change of method to support him)? Am I getting in the way of Gennaro’s process?  

“Kevin helped me to develop ideas and not put words in my mouth.”

- Gennaro Nigro

COMMUNICATING IN HIS LANGUAGE

I began to look over previous notes, and I noticed a pattern in Gennaro’s communication. Via metaphor, his communicating the language of his world using terms like “marathon not a sprint” and “taking one day at a time”. Using these action metaphors, Gennaro was unconsciously sharing that he sees the world in this way or that his preference is to communicate in this way.

This was also represented in his behaviour, Gennaro is a doer, and doers connect with practical and embodied types of interventions. He further solidified his preference through his actions. He bought the Soccology book, read it within a short space of time, made notes, put in visual markers and prepped questions to ask me. A keen learner, who liked doing, thinking logically and, in his words (in reference to CBT activities) “enjoyed having something to reference, instead of working from memory.” All examples of Gennaro indirectly communicating how I must support him so I changed the path and began to use cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) activities. Gennaro engaged more in the logical activities and a more direct type of conversation. 

He was in his head, using logic to discuss parts of his experience that would commonly promote an emotive response. With this being the case, it was important that I met him there (using logic) and work towards bringing him into his body (to improve rapport with emotions).

“Kevin prepared me for the future, even the things I was unwilling to hear and that’s one of the most import skills in life. Empowering me.”

- Gennaro Nigro

ON THE PITCH

During Gennaro’s games it was difficult to find someone who covered more ground than he did. What he was going through didn’t affect his effort but it did affect his attitude towards risk, with him avoiding the burden of risk in different types of ways.

OUTCOMES

After completing the 10 week programme, Gennaro developed an awareness of how he skillfully opts for logic, in place of emotion. This new level of awareness led to the development of the capacity to analyse current behaviours, explore the emotion and trace it back to the root.

For example, on one of my post programme check-in calls, Gennaro took a conversation about how he manages his emotions within one context and used it to identify the history of his emotional behaviour within another context. He not only identified a pattern in his behaviour, he also traced it back to two key moments and a key person in his childhood.

His growth was also reflected in a conversation we had about the emotional state of football players and the state of the football system (below). Content I now use the content as part of the Soccology eSchool.

Please note: The clips are not from my one to one sessions with Gennaro. This is an open conversation with Gennaro, Roma and Belgian U19 international Keres Masangu and myself.

“I found the sessions powerful. Kevin’s approach was a key role in developing my understanding of myself.”

- Gennaro Nigro

WHAT NEXT?

Now that football has resumed, as world resumes its pre-covid schedule, we will get to see how the changes affect Gennaro’s performances on the pitch.

I’ve given Gennaro some methods to use to build upon his outcomes. Although our sessions have come to an end, we are still in contact, as I carryout “check-in” sessions.

A MESSAGE FOR…

The Players

As you know football is a career of ups and downs, the best way to survive is to prep and develop (emotionally). You train hard for years to improve physically, making your body suffer great stress to meet the demands of the game. What do you do emotionally to meet the demands of the game?

The reality of football is that you will be dropped, rejected, have a manager that doesn’t communicate with you, have coaches that abuse their power, experience a dip in form, will struggle to adapt to different environments, get injured, feel isolated and more. Developing emotional intelligence will help you to manage better.

Emotional management is currently an after thought, seeing a therapist after feeling emotionally challenged. The best footballers in the world manage the above effectively. Their childhood prepared them for it, or they struggled whilst in the system and learned how to adjust during the process. Those who struggle to manage within the emotionally intense environment shouldn’t leave the game or play levels below their potential, for this reason. Don’t be that person, you can develop your capacity to flourish within the intense space.

If you would like to start developing your emotional literacy, I recommend starting with a journal (can use “notes” on your phone). Bring your emotions into consciousness, write down how you feel in training and matches everyday. Pay particular attention to key moments e.g. when you progress or when you get dropped. Also make a note of the process e.g. if you were upset about being dropped, were your feelings of sadness/anger solely based on not playing or because the time wasn’t taken to explain the reasons why?

Name and describe your feelings, happy, sad, joyful, angry, green, red, and any random word you can think off. Get in touch with yourself and do not worry about how it sounds, it doesn’t have to make sense to anyone but you. Patterns will emerge, and you will develop your emotional literacy.

Lastly, own your feelings, everything must start with “I/I felt”. Nobody can make you feel. Start to take control of your words and that will be the beginning of you taking control of your career and your life!

The Coaches

This case study was important for me, in my development and I feel it is important to share for the development of others. Because we are in a world where people feel it’s not okay to make errors or doubt yourself. For this reason it was important for me to share my doubts and insecurities around my approach. It shows that being in that space contributes to success, as the doubt encouraged me to revisit notes and pick up on Gennaro’s preferences that he was communicating unconsciously.

I also believe that it gives other professionals permission to be vulnerable too. That’s where growth is.

Vulnerability supports the growth of the professional, it also encourages the players to be vulnerable and grow too. Traditionally coaches say “my door is always open”. However many coaches take the metaphor literally, as in the player can come to my office and speak to me. But the metaphor is not about the door or the office, it’s about you being open. You the person. Players watch you all the time, how you react to people’s mistakes, how you talk about others, how respond to news you don’t want to hear. They assess your responses and formulate whether your metaphor is authentic or not. Be you, so they can be themselves too.

I hope you enjoyed reading this case study, if so, you may enjoy my book - Soccology ;)