Bob Rotella, the sports psychologist, once wrote a book entitled Golf is not a game of perfect. Its argument was that, while players who strive to be flawless tend to be committed and dedicated, they are also likely to be weighed down by stress and anxiety.
As Christophe Berra suggested yesterday, footballers, especially defenders, are not immune to the same pressure. As the centre half admitted to a group of earnest scribblers, he will have much more to lose than the strikers in Scotland’s squad if he makes the slightest mistake in Saturday’s World Cup qualifying match against England.
“I’ve always said that, leading up to games, week-in, week-out, you’ve got to be more concentrated and focused,” Berra said. “In the build-up to a game, strikers can f*** about. It’s true … they’re having a laugh and a joke.
“The central defenders are sitting there saying to themselves: ‘I can’t make a mistake today … I can’t’ – or we’ll get crucified by you guys. So it’s more of a mental thing, about concentration, for defenders. Further up the pitch, you can be a bit more relaxed. Definitely.”
There is an important psychological distinction between striker and defender. One has everything to gain, the other everything to lose. When Scotland were beaten 3-0 at Wembley in November, the focus was less on the chances missed by Gordon Strachan’s side than the ease with which England scored.
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Three headers, three goals and three straightforward points for England rendered irrelevant a decent performance by Scotland, although Berra, who partnered Grant Hanley in his team’s central defence, has tried not to beat himself up about the the way it occurred. Football, after all, is not a game of perfect.
“Look, you break any goal down and they’re all avoidable,” he said. “Even the 25-yarder, people will tell you someone could have closed the scorer down better. That’s part and parcel of football. When you are playing, it just takes a split second. You might not pick up your man, might decide to get into a position to anticipate something — and they do something different [and] score a goal because of it.
“So all goals are avoidable. That’s the sport. It’s what you guys write about. If it was boring and everyone was perfect, every game would finish 0-0 and you’d have nothing to write about.”
If Berra has a little more perspective than he once did, that is because he has been around the block, at club and international level. He has spent the last eight-and-a-half years with Wolverhampton Wanderers and Ipswich Town, during which time he has made 35 appearances for Scotland. It is more than nine years since he made his international debut against Czech Republic in Prague.
Having returned this summer to his first club, Hearts, he is in a good place, on and off the pitch. The 32-year-old is close to his family and friends, including his daughter who is starting school in Edinburgh. Ian Cathro, the club’s head coach, has handed him the captain’s armband.
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Unlike some of his colleagues, Berra has something of the old-fashioned, heart-on-the-sleeve defender in him, but he is determined not to be carried away by emotion during England’s visit to Hampden. He will try not to think about the opponents, about defeat or about the rivalry between the supporters. He will focus on the gameplan, the need to remain calm and the three points that would transform Scotland’s World Cup qualifying campaign.
He admits that there is a sizeable gap between the teams, at least on paper, but, if anyone has cause to be afraid, it is England, who carry into the Group F match quite a burden of expectation. “They are top players but they will have a bit of a fear factor as well. There is a lot of pressure on them. If they lose against us then the press will ridicule them. I always say the press is bad but if you go to other countries such as Spain, Italy and Germany then the press will be the same and you will get stick. That is part and parcel of football and sport. They are under pressure to do well. It is going to be a tough game for both teams.”