The increasing level of physical fitness among soccer players necessitates the exploration of alternative training methods to enhance overall performance. Perceptual-cognitive skills are crucial for sport-specific capabilities such as decision making and reactive agility, enabling athletes to extract visual information from foveal, parafoveal, and peripheral vision. This study focuses on optimizing the utilization of peripheral vision in sports, addressing the demand for specialized training techniques and investigating additional avenues for practicing soccer-specific skills. This study assessed the impact of a 6-week intervention on the perceptual-cognitive performance of elite youth soccer players by examining peripheral perception, response time, and task-switching during soccer-specific motion execution. Outcomes were measured through a reactive agility test, a simulated decision-making task, and a maximal sprinting speed test. Using a pre-post design, 22 healthy male participants were divided into an experimental group and an active control group. The experimental group engaged in sport-specific tasks designed to enhance their perceptual-cognitive skills. Results revealed that the experimental group demonstrated significant improvements in reaction time during both the reactive agility test with and without a ball, an increase in the number of correct decisions in the simulated decision-making task, and a noteworthy enhancement in maximum sprinting speed, while handling a ball compared to the control group. While further research is needed to translate these findings into practical field settings, this study indicates that soccer-specific demands, extending beyond physical aspects, can be effectively targeted and improved.
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