High performance sports psychologist Misha Botting will be available to the Scotland squad to work with and talk to in the build up to the Women’s Rugby World Cup.
From last week until the start of August when the group of 32 will be named to go to the showpiece event in England, 38 players will be taking part in five weeks of training camps which started last week, then the will build up to the Summer Tests and then take part in those matches on the road versus Italy and Ireland.
It will be an intense period and Botting, who was born and brought up in Russia with a background in ballet and recently completed an 18-year stint with the Scottish Institute of Sport as sport psychology manager, will be on hand to work with the group and/or individuals in the coming months, according to Scotland head coach Bryan Easson.
“Misha Botting has been working with us, indeed he has worked with us for the last couple of years,” Easson said.
“He’s worked around some team work, but he’s also worked with individuals.
“Misha is still available and he still does workshops with us. He’s always there if needed while we’ve obviously got a brilliant medical team in place.
“We’ve got doctors, we’ve got physios, we’ve got clinical psychologists that we use and the mental part of the game, as we all know, is so important, just as it is in real life.
“It’s really important that everybody has a resource available to help that mental side because we know that when you feel good you perform well.
“The individual is the most important person around.”
In the last 18 years while with with the Scottish Institute of Sport, Botting has supported athletes through four Summer and three Winter Olympics, Commonwealth Games, Europeans and World events. He has worked with athletes and coaches from 23 sports in that time.
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Micha Botting is pictured
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