Effectiveness of motor imagery on sports performance in football players: A randomised control trial

Background: Nowadays, the development of training programs for speed, agility and reaction time responses in football players is increasing widely. Motor imagery is a new method that uses collateral with physical training. However, there is still a scarcity of evidence concerning the addition of motor imagery protocol to routine training programs.Objective: The main objective was to compare speed, agility and reaction time after motor imagery training in university athletes and amateur athletes who received and did not receive motor imagery training for 2 weeks.Methods: Participants were divided into 4 subgroups as follows: university athlete group with motor imagery training and control group, amateur athlete group with motor imagery training and control group. This study collected the training effects of speed, agility and reaction time. The Wilcoxon signed-rank test and the Mann-Whitney U test were selected to analyse the differences within and between groups, respectively.Results: The result presented positive changes in all variables after training sessions for 2 weeks in all groups. Speed at 20m, agility, and reaction time were found to be significantly different after motor imagery training in both university athletes and amateur athletes.Conclusion: This finding demonstrated that the addition of the motor imagery training along with routine physical training promotes physical performance in athletes at all experience levels. In further studies, the retention effect after practice should be considered.