'Players need a cause to rally round'

While the Steve McClaren regime is still, for many, no more than Sven Lite, there have been some subtle changes, one of which is the regular appearance on the official cast list of "Psychologist: Bill Beswick". Exactly what the author of Focused for Soccer and Beginners' Basketball does and how he does it is something of a mystery; all interview requests are declined, and the Football Association website gives Beswick four strictly biographical sentences. But his inclusion as a paid-up member of the coaching staff is a belated step in the right direction according to Gary Leboff, a fellow sports psychologist who has worked with eight of the current England squad over the past three years.

Leboff is a supporter of Derby County, where Beswick first worked with McClaren before joining him at Middlesbrough and now the FA. "I've been a big admirer of Bill Beswick's work," he says. "He knows his stuff, and I was disappointed he wasn't appointed full-time from the start. Sven Goran Eriksson said his biggest regret looking back was that he didn't take a sports psychologist to the World Cup. For me it was an abdication of responsibility that they didn't, it was amazing that England could even have contemplated doing that. Jürgen Klinsmann brought a whole team of American sports psychologists over, which explained his team's dramatic reversal in belief. At the top level of sport the performers are pretty much all as good as each other, so it's those who think the best under pressure - ie, penalty shoot-outs - who triumph."

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So what sort of things should Beswick be telling the squad? "What you want to generate is a cause, a flag to rally round. That's like a 12th man. Ask yourself how Italy managed to win the World Cup. They went in on the back of a bribery scandal and that was a gift to any psychologist. For Italy, it would have been about honour, restoring the pride of their country. England? I've never seen the team have a cause of any kind apart from in Munich in 2001, when they knew what they stood for and had a very strong cause, which was about destroying Germany, the old enemy. You generate a cause and get everyone to buy into it, going in the same direction."

His take on Eriksson, a little surprisingly, is that the Swede began as a risk-taker before losing his way: "What the players loved was the freedom he gave them and sense of 'dare to lose to win', which worked until just before the 2002 World Cup when, how can I put it, matters off the field got in the way. McClaren knows he needs to be more daring. But the trouble with the England job is you've got such pressure that taking risks is very difficult. You know you'll get hung, drawn and quartered if it doesn't come off.

"So it's all about taking appropriate risks. I think McClaren's finding that a very difficult blend, and also finding the transformation from club to country very difficult. It's also about gaining authority within the dressing room, and right now that's my concern for him."

Leboff is also keen on the softly-softly approach rather than touchline ranting: "It always amuses me on Sunday morning in the park to see managers shouting, because that's the opposite of what works. The likes of Jose Mourinho and Arsène Wenger say very little and say it quietly. Choose your words very carefully and make them count.

"That's one thing I'd be advising Steve McClaren to do. Chelsea were one down to Porto and Mourinho at half-time told them, 'This is your chance, go out and express yourself'. Don't tell them that if they don't wake up, they're going out of the cup. A clever manager gets players to think about what they want, not what they don't want. That's one of the great secrets of sports psychology."

There is even a secret to converting those penalties. "I was called in by one Premiership club before a big cup-tie that might go to penalties. What I did was let them have a shoot-out themselves, and there were balls flying out all over the place; one nearly hit a bus going past the training ground.

"Penalties are missed from the moment players stand up in the centre circle until they get to the ball, because they change their minds. So I made them tell me beforehand which foot they'd use, whether they'd place or blast it and which side they'd go. They weren't allowed to change their mind. They all scored. The great abyss they fall into is doubt, so you remove the doubt from their mind."

Sports psychology, or performance coaching, is nevertheless still in its infancy in England, where the national psyche, Leboff acknowledges, is not conducive to success in sport or anything else. "England seems unwilling to adopt a willingness to do whatever it takes, which is where we fall short. I don't think we want to win badly enough and we settle for second-best the whole time. Look at our railways, our road system, our NHS."

Positive thinking is required. Just as the England team should in the past week have been putting aside all thoughts of failure to qualify for the Euro 2008, so Leboff believes those teams involved in relegation struggles must clear the mind of negative thoughts: "I've helped clubs in that situation and it's all about limiting the stress. You have to insulate the squad from everything else going on.

"I saw Richard Murray, the Charlton chairman, talking about losing £30 million or whatever, and he's a good guy but that's spectacularly unhelpful. You have to free yourself from the stress. That is exactly what West Ham have been unable to do. They look stressed the moment they take to the pitch. Man-chester City have looked so stressed, even their movement is so robotic.

"You can't play sport at that level in an anxious frame of mind. At the bottom of the table, you need to divorce players from the consequences. OK, we lost a game, The End. We tell ourselves to go out and win the next one."