Norbert Alblas, the goalkeeper of NEC, got help from a mental coach after he made a number of painfully wrong in the past games. The 27-year-old Amstelvener blundered twice during the 5-2 defeat at Telstar.
Also in the match that followed, a home match that NEC won 3-2 from Excelsior, Alblas went wrong at a goal. That‘s what the goalie did, because he started to worry. “And then what happened to Telstar happens to me,” he says to de Gelderlander. “It’s pretty hard to deal with that. If you stick around in what happened, it will affect your next game.”
With the help of a mental coach, the goalkeeper, who managed to keep his goal clean against Cambuur (0-0), came back on top. Peter den Otter, the goalkeeper trainer of RKC Waalwijk, is the one who supports Alblas. “He‘s been helping me since my time at Ajax. He’s also been a goalie, and he knows exactly what I‘m going through. He says the right things to me, and after Telstar-out, he said, “Look what you’ve been through. And then after one game in Velsen-Zuid, you leave your head hanging? Come on.”
This helped the goalkeeper in the match against Cambuur, making NEC in sixth place in the Kitchen Champion Division. On Thursday, the team of trainer Rogier Meijer will play a cup match against Fortuna Sittard.