ABSTRACT
This chapter outlines the significant research and writing on soccer, and the psyche that speaks to soccer. It helps to identify and amplify the subject by including only a small portion of the work of others in the field. The chapter explores the sports psychology and soccer, play and performance studies, the hunter archetype, the bush soul, the Olympic movement and Greek antecedents, spirit and the split between mind and body, stage fright and life or death experiences, and finally, Carol Dweck and mindset. Sports psychology now explores issues that may reach into areas where clinical psychology can provide perspectives, which may benefit and support the science rather than challenge it. It often refers to these issues as 'psycho social'. Species who play the most also engage in activities that expend kinetic energy in sudden quick bursts, such as fighting, fleeing, mating, hunting, maintaining dominance, and protecting turf.
