The Sports Psychology Blog
This Sports Psychology blog comes as Barnsley lose their Wembley FA Cup semi-final to Cardiff City, by a single goal.
Football: Kayode Odejayi - A Wembley Moment
It's the moment you dream about as a young striker. A Wembley final (semi-final). You are through on goal. One-on-one with the keeper. This goal to change the game. A clinical finish. The back of the net bulges, as your team-mates mob you. You can already see tomorrow's headlines.
For Kayode Odejayi, today was his Wembley moment. The day when he was one-on-one with Peter Enckleman. With the opportunity to score the goal, that would put his side level in an FA Cup semi-final.
Unfortunately for Kayode, he missed. It was Gordon Smith for Brighton in 1983. Now it's Kayode's turn to inherit the mantle of big Wembley misses. By the look of his face at the final whistle, it's a moment Kayode will find hard to forget.
The long run, through on goal, can be both a blessing and a curse for a striker. A blessing if you are full of confidence and belief in yourself. Because, you absolutely know that you are going to tuck the chance away. Your thoughts are clear. You are in charge of the moment.
A curse if your confidence is low. Because in the run-in to goal, you have time to think. Too much time, inviting too many thoughts. Mostly negative ones. By the time it comes to shoot, you are not clear what to do. So you hit and hope.
The subsequent miss confirms your self-doubts. Doubts that have proved more powerful than your self-belief in the intoxication of the moment. You want the ground to swallow you up, because you cannot stand the desperate feeling it leaves in you.
The missed chance will repeat itself over and over again in your mind. You desperately want to replay the moment. And you have to live with the pain of knowing that you can't. You feel that you have let everyone down. Players. Management. Fans. Family. Friends.
For a period of time, you live in a world that seems unfair. Then you have to snap out of it. And make a decision. A decision that says that you will not let this get to you. You remember Stuart Pearce, and the redemption he found in Euro '96, when his Quarter-Final penalty, laid the ghosts of Italia '90. Redemption founded on courage and personal will.
Maybe you work out with your management team the thought processes that led to the miss. The brain patterns that would cause you to put the ball to Enckleman's narrow side, rather than to his right, where the net seemed inviting. Maybe you learn more about how your confidence gets affected by doubt. And you resolve to do something about it.
For you know, as a striker, that you will be one-on-one with the keeper again. You know that you have time to think. But, by learning from your Wembley miss, you will know exactly how to manage your thoughts to achieve one aim. To see the back of the net bulging.
Right now Kayode Odejayi won't be feeling too good about himself. But, if he can summon the mental strength, he can use his Wembley miss to make himself a better striker. Either that or let the moment get to him. But that, should not be an option.
