Dr. Ágota Lénárt, Head of the Department of Psychology and Sport Psychology of the University of Physical Education met with the academic students of NEKA in Balatonboglár. At the kick-off event of the joint sports psychology program, planned for a 10-month period, the practitioner immediately set to work and invited students to undertake various types of psychological tests.After processing and analysing the results, a tailor-made "NEKA" specific schedule will be prepared, according to which this year the mental preparation of our players will take place.

„My first impressions are very positive, the youngsters worked well, they were skilful and disciplined” – said dr. Ágota Lénárt to our homepage following the tests, which included among others exercises about the team, the environment and the athlete status as well as more personal questions about anxiety and self-confidence plus drawing tasks. “Our aim is to have players who can stay mentally strong in tense situations. We have seen many athletes who had been prepared physically perfectly to perform well but failed from a mental point of view. We teach various methods to make them learn to cope with such situations, and by mastering these, players will be able to control their body and mind perfectly, at will.

According to the expert, the mental development of students not only serves to achieve good results at the moment, but also to lay the foundations for their adult careers. In order to serve this, they will also be introduced to the basics of relaxation, mental training and attention focus during the course of the ten-month programme. In addition to group activities, according to plans they will have the opportunity to receive individual consultations, and this will not only be available for the young students, but also for all staff members involved. Dr. Ágota Lénárt is of the opinion that handball is not only a real team sport on court, but also off court, and they have to adapt to that situation with their methods.