References

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUWGBQsnz-I  (YouTude Video - Motivation quotes, Week 5)
• Sportskillmind.com (http://www.sportsmindskills.com/sport.php?id=8) - Mental Imagery
• Sportsskillmind.com (http://www.sportsmindskills.com/sport.php?id=7) - Self Talk
• Loughborough College PowerPoint Presentation - Psychological Skills Presentation by Danny Lee.

Justification of PST

The reason why I choose Imagery and Self-Talk was because Player P wasn’t mentally prepared during training and matches and the two strategies helped her boost psychologically to improve on her weaknesses (confidence and communication) and her performance. There are several other strategies which I could have used to improve Player P’s weaknesses; some of these strategies are SMART goal setting, listening to Music, Progressive muscular relaxation and Yoga.

   SMART goal setting: setting SMART goals for Player P could have been beneficial however not as much as the two strategies used as she is a visual learner. Personally, SMART goal would have put her off track as she prefers visual and kinaesthetic types of earing rather than visual and auditory learning styles.

   Listening to Music: According to Player P, she loves listening to music; although while training it is a distraction for her as she tends to lose concentration from the training causing are to perform poor during matches as training won’t be accurately.

   Progressive Muscular Relaxation: The aim of this strategy is to improve performers physically however as for Player P ; physically she was good however psychologically she was never prepared to face her barriers which why I choose Imagery and Self-Talk instead of Progressive Muscular Relaxation.

   Yoga: This strategy is really good to improve concentration and self-esteem however Player P doesn’t prefer a very quiet environment which again distracts her and puts her off track. 

In conclusion, the two strategies used were very beneficial for Player P as managed to complete the six week PST successfully, managed to improve on her weaknesses of confidence and communication and will continue using the strategies during her performance as she found it very useful and something that decreases her anxiety levels.

Week 6 of PST

Week 6 (Evaluation)
Length and Venue of Session	Why the Strategy is used?	Benefits for the performer/ Team	Areas of Development for Next Session
This last session will be held at the same café which was used during the first meeting. During the session, the psychologist will go over the progress and the determination Player P put into the programme planned.	This last will acknowledge Player P about her progress which according to her was impossible. She will be motivated to continue using the two strategies during performance to aid her best performance every training sessions and matches.	The feedback results were positive showing how useful and beneficial Player P found the six weeks programme. It stated that, “I have managed to build up by confidence and reduce my anxiety levels through the two strategies which I will use daily during training and in matches. I have also learnt to be more social able and communicate well during performance”. Player P’s team members were also happy with confident P and improvement she managed to successful complete.	No further session required.

Week 5 of PST

Reference:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUWGBQsnz-I

Week 5 (Self Talk)
Length and Venue of Session	Why the Strategy is used?	Benefits for the performer/ Team	Areas of Development for Next Session
This week the performer will be shown a motivational presentation/song and will told to record herself on her phone Self taking positively before a friendly match. The performer will have to listen to her recording during break periods to keep boosting confidence. The session will take place in the conference room and will last approximately 20-30 minutes.	After working on improving positive self-talk for a week, the psychologist as decided to analysis Player P’s performance to see if she has fully improved on her weaknesses.	From analysing Player P’s performance, the performer has improved on the confidence and communication which will benefit both the team and Player P. As a result this demonstrates that using Self talk work out really well for Player P.	Player P seemed pretty comfortable and happy with the session plan programmed to meet her demands.

Week 4 of PST

Week 4 (Self Talk)
Length and Venue of Session	Why the Strategy is used?	Benefits for the performer/ Team	Areas of Development for Next Session
As Player P felt pretty comfortable last week, the psychologist has decided to only invite Player P to discuss and inform about the Self Talk strategy in the changing rooms. During this session, the psychologist acknowledged Player P about Self Talk and how this strategy can improve Player P’s performance levels by increasing confidence and communication. The session will roughly last for about an hour and a half.	In this week, Player P was informed about Self-Talk. After seeing a slight improvement in confidence and communication skills; Self-Talk will fully develop the slight improvement into fully improved performances. During the session, Player P was asked to fill in a questionnaire to understand whether the strategy would work for them.	This will benefit Player P to fully improve on her weaknesses (confidence and communication) and will also benefit the team as they’d have a new confident Player P who not only will be confident but will also communicate well while performing.	During this session, Player P felt a bit of discomfort as her friendly team were a bit nosey trying to listening to the conversation we had in the changing room. This had an impact on her concentration levels as distraction was present.

Week 3 of PST

Week 3 (Imagery)
Length and Venue of Session	Why the Strategy is used?	Benefits for the performer/ Team	Areas of Development for Next Session
This week the performer will use the imagery script and the 4 R’s (Relaxation, realism, regularity and reinforcement) during the training session. The psychologist will keep hold on the script she designed and will aim to analyse if the script has improved her confidence and communication during performance. The training will be held indoors and will last approximately an hour.	After working on improving positive imagery for a week, the psychologist as decided to see if there is a slight improvement in confidence and communication or whether they need more time to work on it.	From analysing Player P’s performance, the performer will have a slight improvement on the confidence and communication which will benefit both the team and Player P. This analysis will also benefit the psychologist to understand whether the strategy as worked for the performer and whether they need to change the 3 weeks remaining (which in case isn’t required).	Player P seemed pretty comfortable and happy with the session plan programmed to meet her demands.

Week 2 of PST

Week 2 (Imagery)
Length and Venue of Session	Why the Strategy is used?	Benefits for the performer/ Team	Areas of Development for Next Session
As Player P felt very anxious in the last meeting, the psychologist has decided to invite the coach with Player P to discuss and inform about the Imagery strategy in the conference room. During this session, the psychologist acknowledged Player P about Imagery and how this strategy can improve Player P’s performance levels by increasing confidence and communication. The session will roughly last for about an hour and a half.	In this week, Player P was only informed about Imagery as the psychologists didn’t want to confuse the two strategies at once. The reason why imagery has been chosen first was because after last week’s meeting; the psychologist analysed Player P is a visual learner which meant imagining helps her learn quicker. During the session, Player P was asked to design a positive imagery script; performing a skill in Netball keeping in mind the 4 R’s (Relaxation, realism, regularity and reinforcement)	The knowledge of imagery and the imagery script will benefit the performer to use this strategy during their performance to perform well. This will help her to reduce anxiousness and increase confidence and communication within the team to be able to feel comfortable in the environment she likes being in.	As the session was improved from last week’s session, Player P seemed pretty comfortable and happy with the session that took place.

Week 1 of PST

Week 1 (Introduction)
Length and Venue of Session	Why the Session has been planned?	Benefits for the performer/ psychologist	Areas of Development for Next Session
In this first week, the psychologist will meet up with Player P at a café to discuss what their weaknesses are, whether they knew about these and also understand their family background and reasons behind their high levels of anxiety. During this session, the psychologist will also explain the SWOT analysis and the two strategies they’re going to concentrate on in this programme to improve positive mentality. The session will roughly take about an hour.	The first meeting is vital for both the psychologist and Player P. The session will help the psychologist to analysis Player P’s behaviour and understand the working style of her to plan the programme specific to her individual needs. This session will also help Player P, as they’d analysis the psychologist behaviour and working style which ensures the performer that their working with the right person and will also reduce their anxiety levels as they’d know her.	From this first session, Player P will be acknowledged about their weaknesses (if they didn’t know) and will understand the areas they need to develop on which in this case is confidence and communication. It will benefit the psychologist to plan the programme accurately and specifically meeting the demands of Player P.	As this was the first meeting with Player P, she became very anxious which impacted on her communication. This meant the psychologist wasn’t able to gain all the information required to be able to plan the programme specific to her. To develop this, the psychologist could have brought in the coach which would make her feel more comfortable talking to the psychologist.

Training Strategies

After performing the SWOT Analysis, the two strategies used to improve confidence and communication skills are Selft Talk and Imagery. I've chosen these two strategies because I personally believe that these strategies will help Player P to improve performance further.

Self Talk
This is when a performer talks to themself trying to reduce nervousness and trying to build confidence to enable themself to perform at the best they could. There are two ways the performers think about themselves; Negative an Positive. 

• Negative Thinking -  performers should avoid this type of thinking as Negative self talk impacts on performance. Thinking negative about your ability and yourself will reduce confidence level and increase anxiety levels as you have a doubt in yourself casuing you to perform poor.
• Positive Thinking - this types of thinking is always recommended by psychologicists as it helps improve communication, confidence and reduces anxity which ensures athletes to perform at their best ability.

In Conclusion, performers should avoid negative thinking and convert the negative into positive to be able to improve communication and confidence during performance.

Imagery

This strategy is more common in visual learners. Imagery is when a performer imagine's theirself performing a practical skill or a sport. There are two ways performers Imagine themselves; Internal and External.

• Internal Imagery - this is when a performer imagine themselves performing a skills and understanding the feeling of being able to perform a skill better then anyone else.
• External Imagery - this is when a performer overcomes from imagination and belives their actually performing the sport/ skill.

Imagery can also be negative or positive; if an athlete imagine's themselve negative then they will pevent themselve of performing that certain skill again as they'd fear about what they had imagined. Positive Imagination will boost up athletes confidence and communination within the team as they'd feel comfortable and will link to positive thinking ensuring they' perform at their highest ability.

Overall, I've chosen these two strategies to improve on their weakness of confidence levels and communication skills as the performer needs mental preparation and needs to believe in themself to be able to adapt the environment of a team sports and FIT IN with other performers. I personally believe a mental preparation is more vital than a physical preparation as mentally what you believe will be adapted in physically what you perform. As the perfomer's physical levels are good, the aim of this programme is to improve the psychological  levels as the two weaknesses are based on their mental believe.

Overview of Player P

Player P is a Netballer and performs the position of Centre during matches. Netball is a fast pace game which requires fitness levels high and is mainly performed by females. Player P performs netball at participation level and represents her club. After examining the SWOT Analysis, it has been found that Player P has an Introvert personality. Introvert personality performers are ususally shy, quite, anxious and more private. They get their energy from within themselves and aren't vey socialising. This type of personalities tend to usually lack on communication, confience and becomes extremely nervous and stressed when surgrounded by many people. As for Player P, despite she is an introvert, she has some extrovert characteristics such as ability to work with a team and socialising. Some of her strengths are extrovert and her weaknesses are introvert; which are lack of communication and confidence during performance. Player P gets along with her team members really well although during performance she loses this skills and perform's poor.

During the six weeks, the psychologists as planned a PST Programme for Player P to improve and develop performance levels via working on the weaknesses analysed. As it is a team sport, it is vital for Player P to have communication skills and confidence while performing to be able to win matches. To do this, Player P will have to follow and complete the session planned by using the training methods of imagery and self talk.