I don’t want to hear all the whinging and moaning from kids who aren’t willing to put in 100% effort into what they’re doing.

It may seem a hard rule, but when anyone, especially kids, get into the habit of whinging everyone is affected. And as we all know habits are hard to break, sometimes lasting into adulthood.

People act and behave like the people they are around at any particular time, and on the training ground and soccer pitch this really shows. You can call it peer pressure or anything else you want to, but the bottom line is when it’s negative, it’s no good for anyone.

What i’ve noticed is when in a group, there’s always someone having a whinge, a moan, gossiping, complaining or making excuses. They really get into this bad habit and want everyone else to acknowledge that they are the victim.

But the real problem is within themselves – they have a losing attitude.

There’s no place for whingers in my training sessions

So what I did was typed up a one page “no whinging” contract and got everyone to accept and sign it. Everyone gets a membership card with the “no whinging rule” emblazoned on the back of it and sometimes a big framed sign is displayed near the training area.

It’s unorthodox, but it works.

The whinging stopped as soon as everyone became aware of the negatives associated with whinging, gossiping, complaining and making excuses – they suddenly found that they would lose their dreams of  playing professional soccer if they followed this losing trait.

The problem with whinging is that it’s self-destructive and when you do it, you’re giving your power away to your environment, your situation, your circumstances.

You take responsibility away from yourself and when you do that you lose control of your circumstances – you become a victim.

The clear message here is if you whinge, you lose.