Basketball players and coaches often say that talent cannot be taught. Either you have it or you don’t. This is true, but many talented players fail to reach their potential. Talented players getting lost in the game are not uncommon. To reach their potential, players need highly developed additional skills.

Unlike talent, these skills, which will be developed later, can definitely be achieved through learning and can be practiced and improved upon.

Attention and Concentration on the Court

In addition to physical fitness, athletic characteristics, ball control, shooting, etc., a basketball player also needs highly developed attention and concentration skills, good coordination, high-paced information processing ability, and the ability to master this skill set under pressure. or in other cases make use of them without any pressure. We are all familiar with the kind of players who become notable only when the fate of the game depends entirely on them. Only then do they wake up and start to play well. These are players whose level of excitement is optimal and allows them to perform excellently only in times of pressure. This is good quality, but it is not good enough. Unlike these players, there are others who “disappear” in big games or under pressure. The level of functioning of these two types of players depends too much on external stimuli. In both cases the result is a lack of player stability. Stability is a critical factor for a player as it is an essential element in building his mental strength.

Attention and concentration skills, planning, rapid information processing and other developed cognitive skills are part of the components that create mental toughness.

The training of cognitive systems, together with motor-sensory work carefully adjusted to the athlete, can minimize a player’s dependence on external stimuli and enable greater regulation and self-control.

Remember the award to Rugby Champion Phil Glanville:

“It’s always easy to stay focused and rise to the challenge, when you’re about to lose, but the true art of professionals stems from their ability to perform well over and over again, when people expect them to succeed. This marks the distinction.” . of true champions”.

Cognitive habilyties

There are players who shoot wonderfully, control the ball and have a great time, but when they need to show overall performance as well as think creatively, they fail.

In certain cases, the execution failure is due to the fact that they are unable to coordinate in time or under pressure, all the areas working simultaneously in their brain. This synchronization between areas of the brain can be practiced.

According to John Ratey, a neuropsychiatrist at Harvard University, the more you practice these types of advanced skills (planning, organization, decision-making), the more automated they become. Additionally, Ratey says that exercises involving one part of the brain also benefit the other part, thereby improving multiple skills simultaneously. His explanation for this approach is that the exercise of different abilities, such as spatial orientation, language, memory, sequential thinking, etc. operates different parts of the same systems in the brain. Therefore, operating a particular brain system as a result of exercising a certain skill will also bring about the enhancement of other skills. For example: when a basketball player is doing a drill that requires coordination, visual attention focus, auditory attention, and concentration and at the same time passes the ball and “breaks” a drill into an organized sequence, numbered stages, he is actually practicing the sequential thinking, planning, visual memory and spatial orientation in parallel to motor-sensory work, which requires the coordination and collaborative action of many areas of the brain.

The combination of these actions requires a lot of attention and good concentration skills. In effect, the player is training their higher brain functions and exercising the neurological systems and the way they operate, similar to the way they operate during the course of a game.

In principle, if you understand how the neurocognitive systems work, you can definitely train them and thus improve the player’s skills.

Orientation and disorientation

A sense of orientation is the way a person feels, when he recognizes his location in relation to the space around him in the aspects of seeing, hearing and feeling.

When you talk about good orientation, you usually mean spatial orientation.

For the sake of illustration: imagine yourself traveling on the Ayalon Highway to a place you are unfamiliar with. You would probably be more attentive and aware of your surroundings. You may prefer to turn off the radio. After turning right and going up a junction, you immediately realize that this is not the right junction. You will probably feel that your heart rate has increased a bit and that your lips are dry, your breath would become flat and short and if you look in the mirror, you would see the cloudy look in your eyes. You keep driving and suddenly discover in the distance but clear the Shalom Tower, which you are familiar with. Your initial reaction will be a slowing of your heartbeat, easier breathing, and a focused look in your eyes, because now, even though you are not where you were supposed to be, you have an anchor in space, helping you to find the address. where you should go. The Shalom Tower is your orientation mark in space, or in other words: the anchor that restored your spatial orientation ability.

The ability to maintain orientation is a very important skill for a basketball player, both while moving off the ball and while positioning for a shot or rebound.

Tiredness, stress or excitement during the game can slacken players’ sense of direction and be reflected in dry lips, inner feeling of restlessness and diminished cloudy eyes, the exact symptoms felt by the driver who lost his way on the Ayalon Expressway . In this case, the player will look confused and off center. He has lost his orientation anchor related to the environment around him.

When a coach recognizes such distress in a player, he has to allow a little restraint, in the hope that the player will come to his senses. Sometimes putting him to rest only heightens his sense of stress and frustration and reinforces his situation; therefore, it is preferable for the coach and the player that the latter stays off the court and performs a specific action, which restores the player’s sense of direction to him.

The coach needs to direct the player’s attention to his situation and provide a solution in the form of a new anchor for spatial orientation on the pitch.

It is possible to anchor orientation through physical-motor exercises; through quick simulation exercises or by talking to yourself and internally paying attention to your breathing, etc. It is important to understand that the player’s ability to be aware of his own condition and take care of himself through an immediate solution invigorates his mental strength and sense of self-control.

Bad habits and motivation

Players and coaches often strive to change a player’s bad habit and they don’t always succeed. Unsuccessful attempts to change habits seem to prove that the player is opposed to the change and the coach may interpret this as a lack of player motivation. First, this is the nature of a habit: changing it can be very difficult and causes the player and coach to repeat a well-known pattern of behaviour.
Second: When the concept of motivation is properly understood, it is recognized that motivation enables a person to do what he or she is capable of doing, but it is not necessary to infer that motivation enables a person to achieve what is beyond his or her range. of skills. Motivation, no matter how strong, will not make it possible for a player with concentration difficulties to maintain his level of concentration throughout the match.
In most cases, the player is full of motivation to make the change, but lacks the skill. In other words: “It’s not that the player doesn’t want to, he just can’t!”

A player whose attention is interrupted after 10 minutes of physical and mental exertion will show his “bad habits” at this stage of the game. This is a neurological state, which is not subject to the direct effect of motivation. In this case, the motivation to continue the game (and attempt to concentrate) only makes the situation worse, as continuing the game at this point will only further reduce attention and concentration. The key to changing this situation is the improvement of the initial capacities of attention and concentration and the expansion of the range of attention through focused training. Only after this change takes effect, when the player has the neurological basis that allows him to make his attention and concentration functions more flexible, will he have the functional flexibility that will allow him to change the “bad habit”. At this stage, the awareness and guidance of a coach or sports psychologist will have a very powerful impact. Player motivation will no longer be a concern.

The motivation is always there. What will change is the capacity.

Another example: A player has made a mistake. The game is still on. The player stays on the court, but his thoughts are occupied with reflecting on his mistake. He is unable to let go of these thoughts, not because he doesn’t want to, but because of a recurring circuit in his brain. In this process, the electrical energy produced by the player’s brain stimulates recurring thoughts and the player does not concentrate on the game and makes repetitive mistakes. The player goes through a state of disorientation, which stems from a lack of effective self-regulation. Both the player and his coach react with a high level of frustration.

Is it correct to argue that the player has no motivation to return to the game after his first mistake? Don’t very talented players also experience these situations?

Isn’t it happening to players who are highly motivated to help their team succeed? In these cases, neither talent nor motivation are enough, but a high level of self-awareness and developed attention and personal regulation skills. The player’s ability to come to his senses (in our terms: return to an oriented state) and cut the irritating circuitry in his brain is what will get him back in the game.

There are many different ways to gain awareness and self-control.

These can be achieved through learning and performance can be improved through constant practice. It is necessary to know better the developments in this area, to the extent that it can lead to a change of priorities in the conception of vocational training. This time, for a change, the essence of the matter is not the high monetary investments in infrastructure; rather a true aspiration to excellence and a receptive approach on the part of players, coaches and directors of sports associations.