4 Tactics for Improved Sleep After an Evening Game — The Soccer Mentor

5 min readFeb 12, 2021

Have you ever returned home from an evening game and not been able to get to sleep because of the post-match adrenaline flowing through your body? Thinking about that goal you scored, or the mistake you made. Many people have mentioned this being an issue for them, so today we’re providing 4 tips for improved sleep after an evening game.

Resting is a crucial part of playing sports. We may focus on training and working as hard as possible in the pursuit of excellence, but what we do away from the pitch is equally as important in the pursuit of pinnacle performance. Sleep is one of these things.

However, with the increased number of fixtures taking place midweek — during 2020 and 2021 more than ever — late nights and long trips home have become more commonplace. Midweek fixtures may be more bearable for professional footballers, as their training plans will take into account rest before and after evening matches.

However, for the rest of us, work schedules may not be flexible enough to accommodate such fixtures, and as such it can be difficult to get a good enough sleep to feel rested for a full day’s work the next morning.

How does sleep affect athletes?

It’s important to remember that all athletes suffer from fatigue, regardless of the level they play at. Running solidly for 90 minutes (before even considering the mental strain of football) will tire even the fittest of us out, and everybody needs to rest after intense exercise. Some people recover faster than others, but regardless, sleep is a vital part of the body’s recovery in various ways.

Studies have proven that sleep improves the quality of players’ performance in various sports. In basketball, players who got ten hours of sleep before a match were, on average, 6% to 8% more accurate in their shooting 1. In tennis, those who increased their sleep to nine hours a week were between 36% and 42% more accurate in their serves 1.

In other words, concentration is vastly improved with better sleep. This principle applies in football, too. A lack of sleep or poor quality sleep can lead to mistakes, such as misplaced passes, a lack of sharpness in decision making, poorly timed tackles, etc.

Sleep deprivation also leads to an increased chance of injuries. When muscles and joints are not given the proper chance to recover, they become more susceptible to strains, pulls, tears and twists. Similarly, a lack of sleep can increase stress which can also slow down tissue recovery 2.

How can you improve your sleep quality after an evening game?

Even after a potentially long drive home after a night game, your energy levels will remain high. This can make it difficult to sleep, and even if you don’t feel tired, your body will be. The stress hormone norepinephrine (similar to adrenaline) can take up to 48 hours to wear off after a game 3, making it harder for you to sleep a few hours after a match.

The stress hormone cortisol affects how tired you become and therefore how you sleep. The issue with evening games is that for cortisol to increase as you get closer to bedtime, you don’t actually need to put as much effort in 3. Essentially, you get tired a lot easier.

Caffeine or stimulants in sports drinks naturally increase your energy levels.

So, what are four easy things that you can do to help achieve improved sleep quality after an evening game?

Tip 1 — Redesign your sleeping environment.

This tip is not exclusive to footballers, but anybody who is struggling to sleep likely needs to re-evaluate the environment that they’re sleeping in.

A cool, dark room is ideal for rest. Try to cancel out as much noise as possible — there are several ‘white noise’ apps that you can download on your phone or laptop to play as you try to fall asleep, which are meant to help the mind and body relax.

Blackout curtains, a fan or perhaps sleeping in a separate bed to your partner to make your sleeping environment as cold as possible may be helpful also.

Your bedroom needs to be associated with sleep. This means that it could be helpful to leave your phone and any other electronics out of the bedroom. Don’t turn on the TV if you can’t sleep, but rather try reading — preferably something very, very boring.

Similarly, it may be worth giving yourself some time relaxing out of bed before you try to sleep. Ideally, you’re meant to stop exercising three hours before you go to bed. But this isn’t always possible after an evening game, so by putting your bedtime back by an hour or so after the game finishes, you might actually be able to sleep better — even if not for so many hours.

Tip 2 — Eat before you go to bed.

Research indicates that we sleep better after eating something. Whilst you don’t want to be going to bed on a full stomach, light snacks are valuable.

Dr Matt Plan discussed this for the PFA in an article. He explained that ‘when you pair tryptophan-containing foods with carbohydrates it can help calm the brain and allow you to sleep better. Try a turkey sandwich and experiment to find your best sleep snack’.

Tryptophan is an amino acid (protein) that helps produce chemicals that regulate the sleep cycle.

Tip 3 — Stick to a schedule.

The good thing about football fixtures is that they are planned well in advance of the date of the match. Therefore, you should know when your evening games are going to be at the start of the season. You should try to develop a sleep schedule accordingly, and not divert from it as much as possible.

It doesn’t necessarily matter if you can’t go to bed at the same time every day, but rather that you go to bed at the same time on each day for a prolonged period of time. For example, if your fixture list allows ‘Monday — 9:30PM, Tuesday — 11PM, Wednesday — 9:30PM’, then try not to go to bed at 10PM or 12PM on Tuesdays, even if you don’t have a game.

Tip 4 — Avoid Caffeine!

Levels of caffeine peak in the blood within about 15–45 minutes of consumption, so it’s best to stay away from caffeine filled sports drinks at full time. The substance has a half life of 5–6 hours, so it will stay in your system in fairly substantial amounts for that time. This, of course, can make it even harder to sleep.

We hope that these tips are useful for you and help you to achieve improved sleep quality after evening games. Please feel free to leave a comment sharing your own tactics below!

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Originally published at https://thesoccermentor.com on February 12, 2021.