The Polish goalkeeper does not understand why clubs are not more focused on the mental state of their players
Juventus goalkeeper Wojciech Szczesny believes mental training should be mandatory for football players and that it is “mind blowing” that it is not widespread in the game. Many clubs have invested in hiring psychologists to help players with their mental state in recent years.
But Szczesny feels that clubs continue to underestimate the importance of mental health and that they should focus on it more.
Mental health has been an increasingly common topic of conversation in football as players open up on their issues. Arda Turan, Paul Pogba and Christian Pulisic have been among those to speak about it.
What did Szczesny say about mental training?
“For me, it’s mind blowing that in 2022, professional clubs don’t have mandatory mental training for players,” he said to Kanal Sportowy.
“This is sick, do an interview with any football player and he will tell you that like 70 percent of performance is in your head. And 100% of mandatory training is physical.
“There are psychologists in clubs and player can use their services if they want to, but there is no mandatory mental training. And should be especially in situations when all is well.
“You shouldn’t go to a psychologist only when things are already bad. When you are looking for knowledge about your head only when your mental is broken, it’s harder to obtain that knowledge when your situation is already bad.”
Szczesny reveals ‘pain’ with every save
The Poland international has admitted that he feels physical pain with every save he makes ever since he broke his arms.
“Breaking my arms at gym as teenager costs me to this day,” he added.
“Every save is painful for me. I don’t talk about it too much because I get used to it, but you need to be an idiot to work in a profession when every save – and I make hundreds of saves daily – brings you authentic pain.
“There are maybe solutions for this. If I would remove metal plates from my arms, it could help but recovery would take few months and I didn’t have opportunity like another injury to take care of this.
“I found a solution with my gloves that helps a little but before 2018, I have situations when pain was so big that after training I couldn’t take off my gloves or open a bottle of water.”
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