THIS year is an Olympic year due to the Covid pandemic causing a rescheduling of the massive event. The showcase is set in Tokyo, Japan and it is the 32nd Olympiad of modern times. At this Olympics seen the introduction of a host of new sporting disciplines like baseball, softball, 3v3 basketball and skateboarding to name a few. I have been watching as much as the time difference will allow and have been able to view some of the new sporting additions as well.

One event I have been watching has been the Tae Kwon Do, which is a martial arts event full of action. One match-up I got to see was between Team GB’s Jade Jones and Kimia Alizadeh of the Refugee Olympic Team. Jones, who lost the bout, was a two-time consecutive Olympic champion and was aiming to become the first ever British woman to win gold at three consecutive Olympics and being the reigning two-time champion meant expectations were high.

Sadly, for Jones she lost the bout and her opponent, Alizadeh, later lost her semi-final bout which meant Jones was knocked out of being able to compete for the bronze medal. In her post fight interview Jones could not hold back her emotion and was brutally honest in her assessment of her loss. She stated she had placed too much pressure on herself by going in with heightened expectation. This she told the interviewer made her feel scared coming into the arena.

“Coming out I felt scared and too much pressure. Usually, my whole family are there so when I feel scared them cheering gives me that extra push to go for it. I got trapped in that fear mode today.” Jones said.

Expectation can turn into fear very easily and that fear can be very debilitating to anyone when it gets out of control.

There are a number of things to consider whenever deciding when a good player has become a great player. A player’s skill levels, decision making, especially under pressure, discipline, desire, drive and success all come into question and how consistent they perform this list at a high level no matter their opponent usually is the litmus test that seals their level of greatness.

One area that any great player needs to deal with is expectation. The more a player improves and performs well, the more people come to expect from that player every time they play. Expectation is simply expecting something that should happen will happen, taking something as a given. This can be a huge weight for any player to have to deal with and can have both a positive and negative effect.

As an analogy expectation is like fire. Fire can be used in a positive way and when controlled effectively it can be used to heat your home and/or cook your meals. But when used negatively and not controlled effectively it has the power to burn your house down. Essentially in terms of players, fire equates to fear and not controlling expectations effectively allows the fire of fear to burn uncontrollably, eventually consuming the player and destroying their chance of performing effectively. The fear of losing is very real and once this emotion takes hold it is very difficult to break free from it.

To deal effectively with expectations and keep the fear of losing at bay there are a number of options a player can take to ensure they keep full control of their Fear Fire – allowing them to use it to their advantage during competition. Below I have explained three such options:

IGNORANCE IS BLISS:

For me the best option is to simply ignore the expectations placed upon you. Yes, a handful of good performances will create an expectation surrounding your game, but these expectations are usually from extrinsic personnel, people from outside yourself. Managers, teammates, supports, opposition will all have certain expectations on your performance but ultimately your performance is solely under your control. You have no guarantees that you will perform well every time you play, to perform well it is you that must create the performance.

Therefore, I say expectation does not exist. Yes, you can expect yourself to make a 30-metre kick pass or score from 21metres but sometimes it does not happen. Its akin to a quote I heard about fear:

“Fear is not real. The only place fear can exist is in our thoughts of the future. It is a product of our imagination, causing us to fear things that do not exist at present and may never even happen. Do not misunderstand me. Danger is real, but fear is a choice.”

Replace the word fear with expectation and the word danger with performance and the quote has the same meaning and just as much impact.

GIVE YOURSELF TO A HIGHER CAUSE:

In ancient Greece the Spartans were famed for their deadly Phalanx. The key to the Spartan Phalanx was in the interconnection between every soldier’s shield. All Spartan soldiers fought with their spear/sword in their left hand and their shield in their right. A Spartan soldier’s shield protected the man to his right from below the knee right up to the neck. A Spartan soldier’s shield was not to protect the soldier holding it but the soldier next to him. The only purpose a Spartan soldier’s shield served him was to carry him home on it when they were victorious (dead).

The message here is to play for someone/something else other than yourself. A player will push harder and player harder when they are playing for someone else’s success. Whenever I left the Armagh county team, I had a meeting with ‘Geezer’ to discuss my decision. During the meeting I explained to him that I never wanted to win an All-Ireland medal. I simply didn’t need one because I have four All-Ireland medals at home already, my wife and three kids.

Of course, he asked me what I was doing there then, to which I told him there were other guys in that team that winning an All-Ireland medal would mean everything to them.

If my presence in the team could help them achieve that then I was willing to push myself as much as I could so they could realise their dreams.

CHANGE YOUR OUTCOME MEASURES:

So many people in GAA measure success with a material outcome. This is rife at underage level whereby success is solely measured by how far a team reached in a competition and/or what silverware was won along the way. This is one outcome measure and usually comes because an improvement in hundreds of other outcome measures. Just like Jade Jones her last three Olympic exploits seem to have been underpinned by one loss. The fact that Jones was competing for three consecutive gold medals is a fantastic feat in itself, given what it takes to be an Olympian never mind a successful one. Success can be and, in some cases, should be measured in more ways than the obvious materialistic measurements of success and medals.

Just like a dream or an idea, expectations do not exist as they only exist in the players mind and until they turn their expectations into a performance, they’re not real. Your performance is very real, expectations are not so ‘Expect Nothing!’

Email: pmgoalkeeping@hotmail.com

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Twitter: @MorSchGk