Coaching the Mental Approach to Croquet

With acknowledgements to David Openshaw

You yourself need firstly to be convinced of the importance of the mental side of croquet. If you are not, then don't coach that aspect of croquet. Many players do not believe in its relevance to them. Many people are quite willing to believe a coach who tells them their mechanics of the swing are all wrong. But they have a hard time believing that their mechanics are all right but their mental game is not. However, it is common to see players play well during coaching when the coach is there giving them confidence. But the confidence often evaporates when the coach is not there and shot making success declines.

There are three important croquet skills: shot-making skills, tactical skills, and mental skills. The five key mental skills are

• Confidence
• Staying in the present
• Seeing or visualising your successful shot
• Developing the right kind of thoughts
• Controlling nerves, staying calm

Confidence: To be confident, players need to recognise that they are responsible for their own level of confidence, and that they will play better if they are confident. Confidence does not need to wax and wane dependent on our last result or our last shot. Confidence is needed in times of adversity.

So stage 1 in coaching is to achieve acknowledgement of this…. Then convince the player they can learn to be more confident… And finally go on to ways of building confidence.

Here are some examples:

• Remember your successes, successful shots, successful matches.
• After each game, remind yourself what you did well.
• Practise success. Most practice should be things you can do. Always finish with something you can do.
• After each practice session, remember what you did well, what you learnt, and what you still need to work on.
• Pretend to be someone else. (The World Champion, the best player at your club).
• Think about things you do where you're confident. Try to create the same mental state.

Stay in the present: This means thinking only about the current shot, not thinking about what a good chance you have to win the game, or what a poor shot you have just played. It's very difficult to achieve. Again, work first on recognition of its importance, then go on to give some examples of how to achieve it.

Visualise your successful shot: Train players to see the successful outcome of each shot in their mind just before they play the shot. Another technique is to see a line between two balls as you play a roquet, promotion or clearing shot. In a croquet shot, select two very exact spots on which to land the two balls.

Develop the right kind of thoughts: Let unhelpful thoughts drift away; replace them with something neutral, e.g. focus briefly on how wonderful the sky or nearby trees look. Then focus on the success of your next shot.

Control nerves, stay calm: Ensure you breathe well. Take a few deep breaths if you are particularly nervous. Again, it may help to think about something neutral, or focus momentarily on past success in a previous match or in practice.