Bradley Smith

🇮🇹🧠 Lille manager David Ancelotti: "My priority is NOT to lose the ball... the second priority is to win it back right away. The third priority is when we're not able to keep it, to be ORGANISED enough to recover!" ✅

This picture here (at minute 60)…of the Argentina-England game is largely as a consequence of something called ‘goal conflict’…and involves approach and avoidance behaviour…as the experience of ‘performance anxiety’ plays out… Approach: I want to achieve my objective Avoidance: but I don’t want to mess up Goal conflict (or approach-avoidance conflict) leads to hesitancy, inhibition, and/or passiveness that negatively influences awareness, anticipation, decision-making, physicality, technical and tactical execution. This is why strong mental frameworks for individuals and for teams are imperative. This doesn’t mean that game models; formations; tactics; and substitutions aren’t important. They absolutely can be a way to influence behaviour. But for consistent high performance under pressure, individuals and teams need strong, practical mental frameworks first and foremost. Players aren’t retreating on purpose. It’s an intuitive response to goal conflict. Players experience anxiety (as a result of the conflict) and subsequently retreat. In many respects the England players here are screaming: “I don’t want to be the one who makes a mistake”. It is understandable- these are human beings not robots. Human beings need to be upskilled to move towards (approach) during moments of high pressure. In my new book, Compete, I describe this as the mental skill of ‘intent’ - a mind/body state that influences style of action-execution. Players need to execute with a High Intent (purposeful, positive, proactive) under pressure… Goal conflict has held England back for years. It was seen in the Euros final vs Spain as well as the Euros final vs Italy. It had been seen countless times before these games. Ambitious players and teams need simple, practical, strong mental frameworks to compete under pressure…

“We should have carried on…we should have carried on pushing…” But why didn’t England do what Marc Guehi said they should have done? People can talk about game models, formations, tactics, and substitutes all they want. And perhaps these can make (and did make) a bit of difference. And I’m happy to conceded that a ‘bit of a difference’ can mean quite a lot when it comes to high performance sport. But this misses the point of what a high performance team needs to do and who they need to be… “Our number one job on the pitch is to compete in our High Performance Mindset (HPM). We compete in HPM no matter what - no matter who we’re playing, no matter how we’re playing, no matter how the opposition are playing, no matter the state of the game…” Ok…so we have a non-negotiable performance philosophy in place. We’re putting mindset first. We’re putting competing in HPM first. No matter any circumstance…we stay in HPM… I would have wanted this for England going into that Argentina game. But now we have a challenge. We need to articulate what HPM is - for individuals and for the team. And this is where it gets complex and complicated. So this is where I draw on three mental skills that England players need optimise in order to compete in HPM: Attention Intensity Intent HPM = High Attention: players constantly focused and connected to the game (connected to ball; space; teammates; opposition in order to read the game) Optimal (mental) Intensity: players competing with a strong engagement - alert and ready - alert to the opportunities and ready to exploit them; alert to the dangers and ready to deal with them High Intent: energy-forward - a purposeful, positive, proactive execution of actions. Aggressive, assertive, action-oriented. “Our job on the pitch is constantly stay focused. Always competing with intensity…and constantly assertive and aggressive. We’re in control and we’re in charge…” And now they need to constantly practice HPM in training. They need to highlight the behaviours and attitudes related to these three mental skills and play them over and over again on video. They need to have regular meetings brainstorming how they’re gonna help each other to compete in HPM. They need ‘if…then’ planning so they have collective ideas to deal with tough moments and mistakes. “Our job when we play Argentina is to execute in HPM. No matter the tactics, no matter the substitutions, no matter tough moments…we will execute in HPM - as individuals and as teammates” That is how you win… ************************************** 𝐇𝐏𝐌: 𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧, 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐲, 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐮𝐬𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐢𝐧 𝐦𝐲 𝐧𝐞𝐰 𝐛𝐨𝐨𝐤, 𝐂𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐞𝐭𝐞.

Thomas Tuchel: #England boss defends tactics against Argentina and blames English football's 'DNA' for World Cup exit. Extraordinary comments- “it ain’t me guv, the players aren’t good enough to keep the ball!” There will be a secondary backlash to this skysports.com/share/13564152

A momentous day for our club 🍒 We are delighted to confirm AFC Bournemouth has been awarded Category One Academy status 🙌 The Academy looks forward to the opportunities that come with competing at the highest level of youth development from the 2026/27 season onwards 💪

I understand the frustration after last night, and there are definitely things that could have been managed differently. Personally, I think Tuchel could have been braver with his substitutions and looked to push for a second goal rather than dropping into such a deep defensive block against the world’s number one, ranked side, led by arguably the greatest player of all time in Messi. That said, it’s worth taking a step back from the emotion and the social media reaction. The online narrative is almost always driven by negativity because that’s what generates attention. If England had won, we’d be talking about tactical discipline, resilience, organisation and maturity. Instead, one result has suddenly become “everything is broken.” The reality is that this England team has shown plenty to be encouraged by. Their structure has improved, they’ve been tactically disciplined, they’ve shown bravery both in and out of possession, and they’ve competed with one of the best teams in world football. That shouldn’t be ignored because of 90 frustrating minutes. Constructive criticism is fair. Writing off the entire team and project because of one defeat isn’t. Sometimes it’s worth looking beyond the headlines and asking whether our opinions are being shaped by what we actually watched, or by the loudest voices on social media. Euros 2028 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿🔜

Marc Guehi says England should have "carried on pushing" after Anthony Gordon's opener against Argentina 🗣💬

@loxwoodfc1920 @walkingego @jamesday85 @GrahamShergold1 @trevk37 @thesnlfdod @TheSnlf ⭐️🐐

🔒 RETAINED | Danny White We’re delighted to confirm that Danny White has committed to Loxwood for the 2026/27 season. Danny’s commitment, determination and winning mentality continue to set the standard. A dependable presence at the heart of the defence, he’ll play a key role as we push the club forward this season. Great to have you back for another year, Danny.⚫️⚪️💪🏻

@loxwoodfc1920 @walkingego @trevk37 @thesnlfdod @snlffood @TheSnlf 🍫 🐐

📣 Retained Our Skipper 📣 We’re delighted that last season’s Chairmans player of the season Scott Symons is staying with The Magpies for 26/27 and will remain the Captain for the season A leader on and off the pitch who sets the standard every day. The skipper stays ⚫️⚪️💪🏻

Ben Wilkinson has left the Club to become a first-team coach at Championship side Derby County. Thank you for everything, Ben, and all the very best for the future! 🩵

39 free agents join us for week one of PFA pre-season 🤝

Muchos entrenadores no tienen un problema de ejercicios. Tienen un problema de diseño. Usan rondos, juegos reducidos y posesiones…pero muchas veces esas tareas NO enseñan a jugar mejor. El error empieza con esta pregunta: “¿Qué ejercicio hago hoy?” Abro hilo.

We are delighted to confirm the appointment of Russell Martin as Leicester City’s new First Team Manager 🤝 Welcome to the Foxes, Russell!

Olise could have finished today with 2 assists and 3 goals. This player is incredibly good. He improves day after day. 🔥

It was all going to plan until instincts took over… Rip The Script

RIP THE SCRIPT @Nike #Ad

❌ There are too many academy coaches hindering children’s development (many helping also) ⚽️⚽️ If you’re a parent or coach 🙋🏻‍♂️ Please retweet ❤️🤙🏼 ✅ My 3 minute video assessing the issues I see every day in the game. Still not enough focus on individual development ✅

At a recent coaching conference, Russell Martin, stood up and said something that every coach who has ever been under pressure to win needs to hear "You can't coach just to win." Before you dismiss that, read what he actually meant by it 👇

A personal message from Head Coach, Tonda Eckert.

If you’re a coach, this is the best 15 minutes you’ll spend today. Thiago Alcântara masterclass 👇