Perched on a rock surrounded by the soothing sounds of a running stream and birdsong, Erling Haaland is a serene figure. Sitting cross-legged with his hands outstretched and eyes closed, the striker is in the same meditative pose that Manchester City fans have seen him in during all of his goals for the club.
The tranquil scene, captured in a video posted to Instagram on the day of the Euro 2024 final, contrasts sharply with the chaos that unfolded in Berlin between England and Spain. While others clashed on the pitch, Haaland sought solace in the silence, rejuvenating himself for the physical and mental strain of the next 10 months.
In a sport dominated by muscle and grit, Haaland’s secret weapon is less obvious: he relies on meditation, but he is not alone in drawing strength from this ancient practice: Cristiano Ronaldo, Mohamed Salah and Raheem Sterling have all sought answers in the quiet power of the mind.
The next generation of footballers are also using meditation as a weapon to hone their performance. In an interview with Gary Neville, Newcastle United and England winger Anthony Gordon said that meditation has become a key part of his routine, helping him deal with pressure and visualize success. Meditation is increasingly seen as a game-changer, allowing athletes to block out the noise and focus on career-defining moments.
According to the Cambridge English Dictionary, meditation is “the act of focusing one’s attention on a single object, either as a religious activity or as a way to calm and relax the mind.” Sounds great for sports, doesn’t it? When under pressure, practicing meditation can help athletes stay focused in the moment and execute their next action, regardless of past successes or failures.
Meditation is nothing new outside the cynical and stressful world of football. Renowned sports psychologist George Mumford has been training athletes to find comfort in discomfort since 1993. His work with famed basketball coach Phil Jackson helped the Chicago Bulls and Los Angeles Lakers overcome the intense “stress of success” to win 11 NBA championships. Mumford’s techniques have been proven to help increase mental resilience and focus, highlighting the impact of mindfulness.
“At the highest level, you have to be able to embrace anxiety and uncertainty, pay attention to what’s happening in the moment and block out the noise,” Mumford, who has also worked with soccer teams such as Chelsea and Fulham, told ESPN. “Reflective disciplines like meditation can help you to manage pressure and stress more effectively, create space between stimulus and response and make better decisions. You have the power to choose your response rather than just react.”
How does it work? Practicing slow, deep breathing stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system, promoting a state of relaxation. This is also known as the “rest and digest” response, which counters the “fight or flight” response mediated by the sympathetic nervous system. Controlling your breathing also reduces levels of the stress hormone cortisol.
Understanding the theory is easier than mastering the practice. Sitting alone with your thoughts can initially feel uncomfortable or frightening as you confront negative emotions you may have been suppressing. But over time, as you master the breathing technique and learn to accept and release these destructive thoughts, a sense of freedom and calm emerges.
“It’s not just about sitting quietly and staring at yourself,” Mumford says. “The first thing you should do is notice how your body feels as you breathe, and use that as a discipline to direct and sustain your attention. As you do that, you’ll find yourself settling into a state of rest and digest. Then you can think about the scenarios in the game that trigger your fight, flight, or freeze response, and how you want to respond.”
As budding athletes see their idols adopting mindfulness, they’re likely to be inspired to give it a try themselves. This ripple effect, along with an evolving understanding of mental toughness (from traditional asceticism to an emphasis on emotional intelligence, resilience and mental health), is backed up by scientific research, further validating the benefits of meditation.
“Thirty years ago I was called the Secret Weapon because people couldn’t really talk about the spiritual world and what it meant to connect with something greater than yourself,” Mumford says. “The research has caught up, and now people are a lot more open.”
A study of mindfulness meditation in US college football players found positive effects on their performance (through improved focus and attention) and health (through improved sleep quality and balance in daily life). Over a nine-week period, players underwent six one-hour mindfulness sessions, which improved focus, calmness, and overall awareness. Mexican researchers implemented a six-week Mindfulness-Based Sports Performance Improvement (MSPE) program with professional players during the competitive season. The results were significantly improved recovery, reduced overall stress, and greater mental clarity and emotional control.
Nevertheless, it’s harder than ever to stop a bad performance from leaving a psychological scar. Social media sends damaging reactions straight into the hands of every footballer scrolling through their phone. Sarah Gordon, an Angel City FC defender, has turned to meditation to deal with on-field anxiety.
“All I cared about was external validation,” she told ESPN about her rookie year in the NWSL after being drafted by the Chicago Red Stars in 2016. “I had so many thoughts running through my head that I started meditating to try and find some peace of mind.”
Diagnosed with ADHD, Gordon initially blamed his poor form on a lack of faith and focus and tried meditation as a way to improve his performance, but soon realised meditation had a huge impact on his personal life, helping him calm his mind and play with more confidence.
“I was a single mom and completely overwhelmed emotionally, physically and financially,” she said. “My life was in chaos and I didn’t know what to do with my emotions and fears. I had a lot of anxiety and I was feeling it all on the field. I was putting so much pressure on myself to succeed for my son.”
“At first I just thought meditation would help me play, but it has affected me as a person.”
At first, she struggled to meditate for even 10 to 15 minutes and struggled with random, negative thought patterns. Now, she meditates for 20 to 30 minutes each day after a cold shower, creating “space for myself” and using breathing techniques to bring herself back to the present. Gordon credits meditation with helping her grow from a struggling rookie at the top level to becoming Angel City’s vice-captain and a two-time NWSL Team of the Year.
“Before, I would tell myself, ‘Don’t be anxious,’ but that would make me even more anxious,” she says. “Sometimes I would let my emotions get the better of me. For example, if my opponent tugged on my shirt, I would get angry and upset, lose focus, and that would lead to mistakes. “But if I take a deep breath and let the emotion go and know it’s not me, I can relax, react in a controlled way and stay focused for 90 minutes. Then I feel so powerful.”
Houston Dynamo’s Griffin Dorsey is another player who was “living the dream life” but “not very happy” after being drafted by Major League Soccer’s Toronto FC in 2019. Struggling with the ruthlessness and pressure of professional sport, his form plummeted, so he turned to Google for answers and found meditation. He thought it was “bullshit” at first, but 12 months later he’s meditating with singing bowls (which produce calming vibrations) and incense, working with a life coach, and finding calm through acupuncture and journaling.
Dorsey joined Houston in 2021 and won the club’s Young Player of the Year award in his first season. He said the pre-game jitters haven’t gone away and he sometimes finds himself lost in “negative space” during games, but just bending down and touching the turf helps him get back on track.
“Earlier this season, away at Atlanta, I tried to backheel when I shouldn’t have and they scored on me,” the defender told ESPN. “I was playing a great game before that and then it happened and I was thinking to myself, ‘Oh man, I played a terrible game. I’m going to be on the bench next week.’ And then after that, I was like, ‘Oh man, it happened. It’s over. Let’s move on.'”
Stereotypes about meditation see it as simply a relaxation and stress relief technique practiced by monks and new age hippies, overlooking its deeper psychological and physiological benefits. For athletes, meditation helps them control their emotions and improve focus during stressful competition. This is achieved through visualization – creating a mental image to focus the mind. Meditation helps athletes gain clarity and confidence when faced with pressure-filled, stress-inducing challenges during competition.
Other actions, like deep breathing, can also keep players grounded in the present. For example, England players incorporated deep breathing into their routine during penalty shootouts to improve focus and manage stress. England breathing coach Stuart Sandeman uses techniques “designed to interrupt negative thought patterns, release tension and improve flow.”
All of this is aimed at getting players into a flow state, or “the zone,” where they experience effortless focus and peak performance — the kind of thing that saw them score 90 goals in 98 games over their first two seasons as Premier League champions.
So next season, when you see Haaland smashing through defences and being cornered by a swarm of opponents, know that he has been rehearsing this moment in his mind. And if he scores, he will be celebrating in the same pose he did when he scored, sitting on a rock in the middle of a raucous stadium, with the water flowing all around and the birds chirping.