Rosado says it's normal for Benfica star to feel targeted | OneFootball

António Silva - who has several suitors - is going through a period of greater pressure at Benfica, after admitting that he feels targeted by excessive criticism and an alleged media and sporting “persecution”. The situation prompted an analysis of the psychological impact that this type of context can have on young high-performance athletes.

Sports psychologist António Rosado, co-author of the book 'Psychological Intervention in a Sports Context', explained that this kind of perception is common during periods of greater instability: "Yes, it is perfectly normal and very common for a young athlete to feel that way during periods of sporting crisis. In elite sport, the line separating reality from a hypervigilant perception is very thin, and he needs to learn how to decode that feeling. When an athlete is under pressure, the brain focuses only on negative stimuli", he told 'Notícias ao Minuto'.

He also acknowledges that, in certain cases, the feeling of persecution may also have a real component linked to media exposure: "The persecution may, however, be real: the press and social media often generate repetitive narratives about certain players to create 'clicks'. For a young person, this can seem like (and often is) a targeted personal attack. On the other hand, in bad seasons for a team, public opinion tends to pick one or two preferred targets on whom to vent frustration. Young players with high exposure or expensive transfer fees are the most frequent targets".

On how to deal with these episodes, António Rosado advocates a joint approach between club and player: "A young person often does not have the neurological maturity or life experience needed to fight the modern football machine alone. However, if the club does everything for him, the athlete will never develop the autonomy needed to survive at the elite level.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.