Lessons from Football

Football is a fascinating sport with millions of fans across hundreds of countries watching thousands of games throughout the year. Everything seems right for the sport i.e. duration, intensity, skill and passion. What makes the game more interesting apart from the footballers are its fans in the stadium. Even on the television, you will find a football match boring unless you can hear the sounds of fans cheering in the background. It makes me wonder what leads them to be so passionate about it and whether it’s actually a good thing. But apart from the joy of watching your team win, there are many other life lessons which we can derive from Football.

What’s leading me to write this post is to get those valuable lessons out in front and also to make a case for why Football or sports in general is important for any individual while trying to justify the number of hours I put in watching football. I am an average 25 year old with an above average interest in Football. I spend my weekends watching EPL, La Liga etc. and everything on my weekend plan revolves around these matches. I got hooked on to Football when I started playing FIFA on Pratik’s laptop and never looked back since. My interest grew as I started following Football and got to know more about it. As for being on the Football field, all I can say is that I have kicked a football a few times and scored goals on both sides of the pitch. For the short amount of time, I have played both as a defender and a striker but I like to think of myself as a midfielder. I know it’s all a little irrelevant information to share but then who’s writing the post.

Coming back to the lessons from Football which I have so clearly mentioned in the title, there are actually a few which we can take away from the game.

-        Football is a team game.

You know you can’t just score goals and win here. In order to win, you need to defend as well. In order to attack, you need midfielders to assist you. In order to defend, you again need the midfielders to do their part. You need to maintain a shape and be on the same wavelength as your teammates. There are set pieces, routines, tactics, movements and every movement should be understood by the other. Your attacking skills counts for nothing if your midfielder can’t find the right pass for you.

It shows you that you can do a lot of things alone but in order to win, you need a team with you.

-        Football needs patience and discipline.

A Football game is 90 min long. As an attacker, you can’t expect to score a goal every other minute even if you are the best player in the world. You need to be watchful, look for opportunities and pounce on them even if it comes in the 90^th minute. There might be matches where you aren’t able to score any goals but you need to be patient and wait for the next chance to make it happen. In life, the chances will be few and far between but you need to make those count.

As a defender, 90 min can feel very long. You need to maintain your discipline and concentration and deal with whatever the other team has to throw at you. Even a lapse of concentration for a few seconds can lead to a goal against your team.

As a midfielder, you need both facets of the game. You need to balance it out properly in the best interest of the team.

Depending on your current role, you can have your own proportion of patience and discipline, but you can’t do without any of these.

-        Football needs skills and practice.

Football is game of skills but skills don’t count for much if you don’t practice properly.  There have been so many players who were so talented but then gave it way just because they didn’t practice properly. If you have a goal in mind, you need to complement your skills adequately with proper practice and discipline to avoid yourself from being an “also there”.

There are so many other valuable lessons in life which we can borrow from Football. I will add those as soon as I find some time.