The greatest European player ever, Johan Cruyff developed his silky smooth skills playing in the streets of Amsterdam. In fact, his mother and stepfather had trouble keeping up with the rate young Johan ruined his shoes.

"My father got up set, and he punished me sometimes, up to the day they decided to buy me a pair of tough football shoes. They took off their studs and they put something underneath. As they did not break, I could use them for everything."

The vast majority of Brazilian professional players have learnt soccer through Futsal they play on every imaginable surface, from the softest of beach sands to the hardest concrete surface.

Diego Maradona, probably the second best South American player after Pele and an idol for million of funs throughout the world describes in his autobiography how he developed his skills:

"... and we'd leave the house at two with my friend, El Negro, my cousin Beto or whoever, and by quarter past two we were giving it all we've got under the midday sun! We just didn't care and we'd run ourselves into the ground."

The 1970 world cup hero Rivelino in his autobiography, Get Out of the Street, Roberto is unequivocal:

"The street formed me as a man and as a footballer."

More recently Rivaldo who has had an extremely successful career as a top professional player overcoming seemingly insurmountable obstacles, acquired his skills, but also strength of character on the beaches of north east Brazil. His daily routine was selling souvenirs to tourists in the mornings and playing soccer with his friends all afternoon.

All these players succeeded because they totally immersed themselves in short sided soccer games which allowed them to develop spatial reasoning, strategic thinking and acting proactive in order to create learning opportunities, and not just physical skills as many people think.

They learnt soccer:

• In small groups
• At a level matching their capabilities
• Without following coaches' instructions
• Enjoying themselves and in step with their own wishes

Total immersion allowed the harmonious development of Body-Spirit-Mind qualities and not just the superficial acquisition of physical soccer skills.

Today, the physical requirements of modern soccer are higher, but this can be developed and usually is the only area that coaches pay attention to. The high levels of intellectual abilities such as creativity, judgment, intuition as well as emotions control and temperament which are vital to the success of a player are usually neglected in the apparent belief that soccer success depends on body training.

Nothing further from the truth! Soccer begins and ends in the mind.

It is unfortunate that the western mind in its quest for analytical rational thinking has dissected the human being and has kept only the physical components