This week’s soccer motivation is about how you can beat players that have more natural talent than you.

Everyone has a certain level of talent – you’re born with it and you can’t affect it. You can’t grow more talent. Don’t worry about what you can’t affect. You can’t affect your talent level. You can’t affect the talent level of the teams you play against. You can’t affect the way the referees call the game.

Instead, you need to worry about the things you can affect.

What you can do though is to develop the amount of talent you have been given. You can affect how hard you work and how hard you train. Here’s the thing about players that are better than you – a lot of the time, they know they have a lot of skill. However, instead of working hard to develop their skill, they get lazy. They try to skate by on talent.

That’s where you can beat players with more skill and experience than you. When they’re taking off after practice, stick around and work. Train

Work with a ball on your off days. Develop your fitness.

One of my favorite quotes comes from Derek Jeter, the pro baseball player – he says that “There may be people with more talent than you, but there’s no excuse for people to work harder than you.”

This is where you beat the more “talented” players – you beat them on the practice field. You beat them by training when they’ve gone home for the night. Then, when you get on the field, you beat them by straight up outworking them. When you get out on the field, the only thought in your mind needs to be that “I will not be outworked.”

Lose the ball? Work twice as hard to get it back. Never give up on a ball. Never give an inch. Grind it out against those more talented players, because near the end of the game, when everyone’s tired, they won’t push as hard.

That’s when you beat them. Every second of the game – work harder than everyone else on the field.

The Rock (Dwayne Johnson) always says that the key to success is to always be the hardest worker in the room.

Be the hardest worker on the field.

That’s the trick.

It’s simple, but not easy. It’s also a choice.

Is it worth it to you?

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If you’re looking for some great resources to get you started on your soccer training journey, check out our individual soccer drills page. These drills are all free and are intended to help you grow as a player.

For something a little more in-depth, check out our soccer training guides section.

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