Tomasz Kuszczak aims to be Manchester United number one

Originally Posted by Argentina

Why do you think players improve with age? In Managing My Life, Ferguson puts Beckham's ability squarely down to the practice he put in on the training field.

Of course - to a certain extent. You, and in this case Fergie, are forgetting the role experience and confidence both play in performance. Naturally a player is going to play better once he's used to the speed of play, pressure etc of playing top flight football, even if his 'technique' has not improved at all.

By the same argument, why doesn't a player keep improving forever? Why, even before age begins taking a toll, does he plateau?

Originally Posted by shenwen

i would argue that yes, some people are born with certain attributes, be it a great balance or hand eye coordination or even simple physiological factors that will always position them different than those without. of course, these attributes also need practice and technique to bring to a certain level, but having them in the first place gives that person an advantage.

why is maradona a better footballer than 99 per cent of other footballers who have played the game? using your logic, he just practiced more.

Because Maradona practiced more. You see pictures of George Best as a 18 month old with a tennis ball at his feet. 10,000 hours is 3 hours a day for 10 years. Chances are Maradona had been saturated in football for 20-30,000 hours by the time he was conquering the world.

I've know a 12 year old who is incredible. His dad's a nutcase and is abusive to him and his mum and they lived near a farm. His grandmother told me his escape from being about 3 years old was to just run around the perimeter of this farm with a football at his feet for hours on end, day after day. His skills are ridiculous and now the more he watches and plays, the more he will get better at the tactical side of the game.
The Keane twins at United are similar. Their brother and their dad told me they would be out in the field for hours smashing balls to each other, challenging each other in skills and competitions.

Originally Posted by Grimson

Of course - to a certain extent. You, and in this case Fergie, are forgetting the role experience and confidence both play in performance. Naturally a player is going to play better once he's used to the speed of play, pressure etc of playing top flight football, even if his 'technique' has not improved at all.

By the same argument, why doesn't a player keep improving forever? Why, even before age begins taking a toll, does he plateau?

Physical things like age and injury take hold. 10,000 hours like I said before isn't just a magic number you get to and suddenly have to not practice anymore. A player with 20,000 hours will be twice the player a player 10,000 hours will be.
I'd say a player reaches a plateau because football skills are 'soft skills' which require practice just to keep them up. Not a hard skill like driving or riding a bike.
You need to practice at a greater rate than the soft skill can detoriorate. A lot of the time, players will reach a level at which they are happy and just do enough training to keep that level.
(think of someone trying to lose weight. If they exercise enough to burn their calorific intake, they will maintain a weight. They need to practice at a greater rate to burn the FAT and the food they're consuming daily. Once they reach their desired weight, they stop exercising so much to maintain that weight they want)

Okay. I'll concede those points. But I'll go back to Kuszczak and try to restate my point: he's been taught the technique. He has doubtlessly practiced it for thousands of hours and kicked millions of footballs. But there is something in his physical makeup, his fast-twitch fibres or coordination or something, which means he'll never handle backpasses the way Van der Sar does. There is more to it than just logging the hours.

Originally Posted by Grimson

Okay. I'll concede those points. But I'll go back to Kuszczak and try to restate my point: he's been taught the technique. He has doubtlessly practiced it for thousands of hours and kicked millions of footballs. But there is something in his physical makeup, his fast-twitch fibres or coordination or something, which means he'll never handle backpasses the way Van der Sar does. There is more to it than just logging the hours.

I can't agree with that. If he did an hour extra everyday until the start of next season, you'd see a huge improvement to the point where he'd be competent, which breeds confidence which would mean more playing time, which can only mean improvement for him.

Originally Posted by Argentina

Because Maradona practiced more.

how do you know? and are you therefore saying that maradona was the best footballer ever just because he practiced more than everybody else.

here's another:
if I practiced as many hours as rooney, would I be as good?
no because despite all the practice I would lack certain physical attributes such as, in my case, speed, balance, concentration (not got a lot to offer tbf). practice won't give me these things, as several of them are genetic. more practice may have made me a much better player but would not have put me in the elite.

the 10,000 hour argument is flawed. it looks great on paper but supposes everyone starts from the same base, which they clearly do not.

Originally Posted by Argentina

I can't agree with that. If he did an hour extra everyday until the start of next season, you'd see a huge improvement to the point where he'd be competent, which breeds confidence which would mean more playing time, which can only mean improvement for him.

So everyone can do what Messi does and be as good as Messi if they practice long and hard enough?

Originally Posted by Argentina

Because Maradona practiced more.

ffs surprised north korea haven't won the world cup yet tbh. they should be able to organise more training hours than anybody.

A player with 20,000 hours will be twice the player a player 10,000 hours will be.

this has to be a £#%&!ing wind-up

Originally Posted by Argentina

I can't agree with that. If he did an hour extra everyday until the start of next season, you'd see a huge improvement to the point where he'd be competent, which breeds confidence which would mean more playing time, which can only mean improvement for him.

That's what's known as a slippery slope argument. If he did A, then B and C are sure to follow. The truth is that if he practiced an extra hour kicking at training, the only thing you could guarantee is that he would get better at kicking at training. Doing it in a game is a different kettle of fish, as it involves a great deal of psychology that can't be replicated in training.

In any case, he already does plenty of kicking in training. All professionals do.

Originally Posted by shenwen

how do you know? and are you therefore saying that maradona was the best footballer ever just because he practiced more than everybody else.

here's another:
if I practiced as many hours as rooney, would I be as good?
no because despite all the practice I would lack certain physical attributes such as, in my case, speed, balance, concentration (not got a lot to offer tbf). practice won't give me these things, as several of them are genetic. more practice may have made me a much better player but would not have put me in the elite.

the 10,000 hour argument is flawed. it looks great on paper but supposes everyone starts from the same base, which they clearly do not.

I reckon everything you do before you're about 6 counts for double. You hear stories of all the top players from when they were younger and they all say things like 'he was as though he had that ball tied to his fee...he took it everywhere'
You don't hear people saying 'oh, I'm surprised he's a pro footballers, he was so into the violin when he was younger'

Originally Posted by dunk

So everyone can do what Messi does and be as good as Messi if they practice long and hard enough?

Yeh. It's not just a case of technique though, it's understanding the game, which is why someone like Jeremy Lynch can do all the things with a ball that Ronaldo can, but isn't even a professional anymore. Also to do with attitude and application and mental things too like that.

Originally Posted by borsuk

ffs surprised north korea haven't won the world cup yet tbh. they should be able to organise more training hours than anybody.

this has to be a £#%&!ing wind-up

Borsuk's here to educate us all.

Your saint and saviour, Ferguson, believes that the making of a player is practice and practice alone. If practicing when you're older makes such a difference, it must make an exponential difference if you did it as soon as you were walking.

Originally Posted by Argentina

Borsuk's here to educate us all.

Your saint and saviour, Ferguson, believes that the making of a player is practice and practice alone. If practicing when you're older makes such a difference, it must make an exponential difference if you did it as soon as you were walking.

does he £#%&!

log off argie.

Originally Posted by fix up look SHARPE

log off argie.

he'll probably find some fergie quote that practice is really important or something and imagine it means practice is the only important thing

practise 20,000 hours and you'll be twice the player as if you practised 10,000 hours

maybe he's been using essien's calculator.

Originally Posted by borsuk

he'll probably find some fergie quote that practice is really important or something and imagine it means practice is the only important thing

practise 20,000 hours and you'll be twice the player as if you practised 10,000 hours

maybe he's been using essien's calculator.

Go and read your bible, Managing My Life and there's a quote about Beckham in it, along with loads of other quotes about practice and honing technique being the foundation on which all other things lie.

As for physical attributes, you can increase your speed, power and strength so if whoever it was is referring to height, I refer you to Messi, Iniesta, Xavi, Scholes, Maradonna and to a lesser extent playes like Deco.
What they all have is technique. Presumably it was god-given because they did something good in a previous life.

#@&%!sack can get better is the crux of it, and you can coach technique and make someone competent no matter what age they are. Obviously he has a long way to go to get to VDS's level, but that's because VDS has more practice/experience in him or maybe it was that he was a Fransiscan Friar in a previous life and devoted himself to humility, abstinence and chastity.

Guy Whittingham

Originally Posted by believe

Guy Whittingham

What about him??

(I may have mentioned before that he went to the same school as me)

Originally Posted by Argentina

Your saint and saviour, Ferguson,

Originally Posted by Argentina

Go and read your bible, Managing My Life

you seem to think having some sort of respect for fergie is something to be mocked. how odd.



as to the rest, nobody has said practice is not important. it's more than important, it's clearly essential as without practice and training you will never become a successful footballer however talented you may be. that, however, is a very different thing to what you have suggested - that practice is all that matters and the ability of a footballer is solely the result of hours put in practising. that's nonsense to be frank and i defy you to find any quote of fergie anywhere where he suggests natural talent plays no part in football.

Originally Posted by borsuk

you seem to think having some sort of respect for fergie is something to be mocked. how odd.



as to the rest, nobody has said practice is not important. it's more than important, it's clearly essential as without practice and training you will never become a successful footballer however talented you may be. that, however, is a very different thing to what you have suggested - that practice is all that matters and the ability of a footballer is solely the result of hours put in practising. that's nonsense to be frank and i defy you to find any quote of fergie anywhere where he suggests natural talent plays no part in football.

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortu...1794/index.htm

My favourite bits

We think we know: Each was a natural who came into the world with a gift for doing exactly what he ended up doing

For one thing, you do not possess a natural gift for a certain job, because targeted natural gifts don't exist. (Sorry, Warren.) You are not a born CEO or investor or chess grandmaster. You will achieve greatness only through an enormous amount of hard work over many years. And not just any hard work, but work of a particular type that's demanding and painful.

The good news is that your lack of a natural gift is irrelevant - talent has little or nothing to do with greatness

British-based researchers Michael J. Howe, Jane W. Davidson and John A. Sluboda conclude in an extensive study, "The evidence we have surveyed ... does not support the [notion that] excelling is a consequence of possessing innate gifts."

It's nice to believe that if you find the field where you're naturally gifted, you'll be great from day one, but it doesn't happen

And for Grimson's point about people hitting a plateau...

The best people in any field are those who devote the most hours to what the researchers call "deliberate practice." It's activity that's explicitly intended to improve performance, that reaches for objectives just beyond one's level of competence.

For example: Simply hitting a bucket of balls is not deliberate practice, which is why most golfers don't get better. Hitting an eight-iron 300 times with a goal of leaving the ball within 20 feet of the pin 80 percent of the time, continually observing results and making appropriate adjustments, and doing that for hours every day - that's deliberate practice.

And my WUM about someone practicing 20,000 hours as opposed to 10,000 being twice as good as someone else

Evidence crosses a remarkable range of fields. In a study of 20-year-old violinists by Ericsson and colleagues, the best group (judged by conservatory teachers) averaged 10,000 hours of deliberate practice over their lives; the next-best averaged 7,500 hours; and the next, 5,000

Actually my favourite bit is this at the bottom of this quote.

Many great athletes are legendary for the brutal discipline of their practice routines. In basketball, Michael Jordan practiced intensely beyond the already punishing team practices. (Had Jordan possessed some mammoth natural gift specifically for basketball, it seems unlikely he'd have been cut from his high school team.)

Still, read it for yourself, or will you be like a religious freaks who accept science one minute and denounce it when it doesn't suit your agenda.

Originally Posted by Argentina

Still, read it for yourself, or will you be like a religious freaks who accept science one minute and denounce it when it doesn't suit your agenda.

i think i'll be like one of those strange characters who recognises that science is not monolithic - something you might like to consider. what you've found is one article partially supporting your claims. that's not 'science', that's one article. in fortune, i might add, which is the business press, which absolutely loves research suggesting hard work can get you to the top, for obvious reasons, just as they sponsor research showing that money motivates top managers but not workers lower down. it's a highly political and controversial piece, not the unanimous view of 'science'.

i could link you to research about heredity and athletic ability (running, types of muscle, heart and lung capacity) or artistic accomplishment without training or at a very young age. but what's the point? it's clear nothing is going to change your mind, however absurd your contention that the difference between mozart and salieri is hours spent practising.

Originally Posted by borsuk

i think i'll be like one of those strange characters who recognises that science is not monolithic - something you might like to consider. what you've found is one article partially supporting your claims. that's not 'science', that's one article. in fortune, i might add, which is the business press, which absolutely loves research suggesting hard work can get you to the top, for obvious reasons, just as they sponsor research showing that money motivates top managers but not workers lower down. it's a highly political and controversial piece, not the unanimous view of 'science'.

It's comment on scientific research. Study from every field fits into the pattern.

Originally Posted by borsuk

i could link you to research about heredity and athletic ability (running, types of muscle, heart and lung capacity) or artistic accomplishment without training or at a very young age. but what's the point? it's clear nothing is going to change your mind, however absurd your contention that the difference between mozart and salieri is hours spent practising.

So, if Maradona's lung capacity is less than Peter Crouch's, surely that would mean Crouch would be a superior player. So why isn't that the case? Oh, an innate ability.
As it says in that particular article, genetics plays a bigger part in what you can't do than what you can do.
So, back to the original point, what is the difference in physical qualities between VDS and #@&%!sack. Very little, so it is purely a case of practice and exposure to certain things, which constitutes experience.

Originally Posted by Argentina

It's comment on scientific research. Study from every field fits into the pattern.



So, if Maradona's lung capacity is less than Peter Crouch's, surely that would mean Crouch would be a superior player. So why isn't that the case? Oh, an innate ability.
As it says in that particular article, genetics plays a bigger part in what you can't do than what you can do.
So, back to the original point, what is the difference in physical qualities between VDS and #@&%!sack. Very little, so it is purely a case of practice and exposure to certain things, which constitutes experience.

Yep. And John O'Shea could easily be as good as Messi, if only he applied himself, the lazy @#%&!.