Mental side of Training ?

[Tombhoneb]

I am coaching this 10 year old kid. He is a good player but it is his mental side that is stopping him from improving even more.
He believes he needs to hit every single ball within a 1m by 1m box. If he hits it just a bit stray he starts wingeing. After that he hits every ball out and his concentration just disappears.

He gets 8/10 of balls perfectly but he still gets upset.

I have tried many things.. Time-outs to get his concentration back, talks with him and the list goes on. What worked the best was making him a big target to aim for

However, as soon as he is hitting outside our lessons and he hasn't got his target, i see him going back to his old ways and hitting balls out that should really be easy balls, solely because he is annoyed at himself.

I need something that doesn't rely on visual targets.

What do you suggest ?

Thanks in advance, Tom

 

[fuzz nation]

You can help the young gun to better understand what he's doing out there, since it sounds like he's more fixated on being perfect instead of pursuing improvement. If he stays in that mindset, he'll obviously be in for a daily dose of disappointment. Confront his expectations. Even though he's young, I'll bet that you can show him how to avoid distracting himself.

What you essentially need to make him appreciate is that he can only focus on one thing at a time - you might be able to demonstrate this by hand-bouncing two balls to him at the same time, but telling him only to catch the one from let's say your right hand. After the catch, explain to him that the ball in your other hand represents the good shot he wants to make, but he could only catch the one that he was concentrating on. It's the same in a rally - if he's getting caught up in his mistakes, he's concentrating on those mistakes instead of what he needs to do to hit his good shots. If this makes sense to him, you can just cue him to focus on his good shots when you see him getting annoyed - he should want to avoid that self-distraction.

Before you even try an exercise like the one above, have a talk with kid about being realistic. Ask him if he's ever going to miss another shot in his life... honestly. He'll have to admit that he will miss a few in his day and once he does, you ought to be able to show him how to keep his play in a good direction even when he's going to make some bad shots. It also sounds like you're doing the right thing by expanding his perception of his target areas. If he understands the basic directions of down the line, down the middle, and cross court, he ought to be thinking a little about the depth of those shots instead of landing them with pinpoint accuracy.

 

[Tombhoneb]

Thanks for your reply Fuzz Nation, im going to try it tomorrow.

I try to explain to him in the nicest possible way that his performance is going to get better if he concentrates on the good shots. I try to do this technique with him where if he hits a ball out, he thinks for a second what he could have done better to get the desired result and then move on. Its worked with other kids so i thought it would help.

BUT .. If i tell him that he needs to concentrate he gets even more upset because he is not giving 100% into his training. I tried taking 2 min breaks every time he gets upset because he wants to play so much that he stopped winging and concentrated. It did work but then we were taking so many breaks that his parents got ratty with me. I told them its for the best but they did not care.

He understands all tactics and the placements of the ball. I tell him forehand to forehand and i want to see how many he can get behind the service line. If he does not get every single shot behind the service line, he gets upset.

I know a coach is meant to be a motivator, nutritionist etc as well as improving their technique but i feel he would really get better use out of a full hours tennis psychology lesson and not hit a ball.

Any more ideas people ?