Decision making influences movement variability and performance of high-level female football players in an elastic resistance task

INTRODUCTION: The inclusion of sport-specific constraints in resistance training promotes the development of player abilities in an integrated way, which maximises the effectiveness of player adaptations induced by training. Considering that perceptual-cognitive abilities play a fundamental role in football, decision making could be introduced to enhance the cognitive similarity of resistance tasks to sport actions. However, it is unknown how decision making as a constraint could affect the player during an elastic resistance task. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the effects of decision making of high-level female football players on movement variability and performance during an elastic band resistance task. METHODS: Twenty-three high-level female football players performed the elastic resistance task with a ball, both as attackers and as defenders without decision making (NDM) and with decision making (DM). The movement variability was quantified using the sample entropy derived from the acceleration recorded with an accelerometer placed at the lower back of each player. The passing accuracy of the attacker was quantified using a scoring scale. RESULTS: Results revealed that adding decision making to an elastic resistance task increased the movement variability of the defender but did not affect the movement variability of the attacker. In contrast, the passing accuracy of the attacker was reduced. Overall, the attacker had a higher movement variability compared to the defender. DISCUSSION: These findings suggest that decision making, as a football-specific constraint, can enhance the potential of an elastic resistance task in training. This is due to the fact that it reduces control and regularity of movement for the defensive role player and increases technical difficulty for the attacking role player. Furthermore, these effects are beneficial, as they can promote the adaptive processes necessary to optimise the performance of the players.