Abstract

Football increasingly demands high performance from its practi-tioners. The rise of this sport has been reflected in the increase in federation player registrations. The purpose of this paper is to iden-tify, assess and analyse the mood and anxiety of amateur football players in U16 and U19 men and regional women categories before and after competition. The sample consisted of 153 young people whose average age was 16.06 years. The instruments used were the Competitive State Anxiety Inventory (CSAI-2) and Profile of Mood States (POMS) in its abbreviated form A, 15 items. The results show that: 1) there are statistically significant differences in all dimensions of mood and cognitive anxiety in men after competition; 2) women present significant differences in the dimensions of hostility, depres-sion, vigour and self-confidence after competition; 3) somatic anxi-ety does not vary according to the outcome obtained in competition; 4) mood prior to competing is different in men and women as there are significant differences in tension, and 5) men show a less anx-iogenic thinking style, a lower somatic response to anxiety and a higher level of self-confidence at the time prior to competing than women. This paper seeks to encourage future professionals to intro-duce a commitment to emotional and psychological training along-side physical, technical and strategic instruction in youth age groups in the process of personality development.