DublinSpur
Scott Parker
I watch a lot of tennis. They have the distinction between "forced" and "unforced" errors, and I think it's a useful distinction across a range of sports. If a stray pass is the result of a player being put under pressure by the opposition closing him down; that's very much a forced error.
It's an unforced error, though, when a player is under no pressure and just casually gifts the ball to the other team with a sloppy pass.
Obviously you work hard on the training field to eliminate both types of error. You try to get the players to be more composed even under pressure so that they can cope better with being closed down. And you do regular drills to build and maintain player focus so that the brainfarts get minimised.
But it's the unforced errors that are the big concern. Those are far more under a player's control, so it's within a player's power to minimise them. If they fail to do that, then it's unlikely they'll fulfil their potential in other areas of their game either. On top of that; if a player is consistently guilty of multiple unforced errors in a match, they very quickly become a liability to the team, the fans start to get on their back, and that rarely improves matters.
As I say though, the great thing about unforced errors though, is precisely the fact that they can be minimised with hard work and dedication. And that's doubly true in the case of young players.
