Really like the "bit of a prick" on the pitch combined with being a decent human being off it.
Well done for so many things Richarlison. Hope he can keep both his joy and goalscoring high.
Good on the club too for helping him out with this. Been talked about before, but while I think improvements perhaps can be made on the general sports psychology and mental approach within the club if a player is in need of or can benefit from psychotherapy from a professional that should happen with someone not employed by the club directly.
There was a very good Athletic article about Richarlison's about-turn.
Here's an extract:
"It can be hard to know where the physical travails end and the mental ones begin because they are often so interlinked, but before we get on to how much of a difference the operation has made, it’s important to understand just how dark things had become for Richarlison psychologically.
“The club helped me to get help,” he told ESPN Brazil on January 12. “That was really important to me because there were days when I didn’t want to leave my house, my room. I went to training and then straight back home and locked myself in my bedroom.”
Richarlison felt trapped. He knew he needed help, but he also knew that his family, from a rural, more traditional part of Brazil would be hugely opposed to the idea.
“I’m from a small town, and it can be a bit like, ‘I’m not gonna do this therapy thing ’cause I’m not crazy’. Because some people from the countryside have this pre-conception, my family has it. But it got to a point when I understood that I needed help. And a lot of people were telling me this. So I got help and the therapist has been helping me a lot. I think after you take your first session you will understand what it means. I was very happy. I’m still doing it and I’ll carry on (with therapy) because it’s been helping me a lot. I think the main thing is my happiness. I was able to find my happiness again. I came from periods of my life when I was very down and sad… I wasn’t the Richarlison everyone knew. Even training was different. So I think I was able to find this again, this hope I had. That was the most important thing I got back.”
Richarlison feels refreshed, getting a huge amount from the sessions with the therapist, who Spurs set him up with.
He also has a new girlfriend, and currently has friends and family over from Brazil staying with him — keeping him company and helping around the house. This has often been the case with Richarlison since moving to England, and tends to be when he’s happiest. He has also managed to extricate himself from the situation with his former agent and mentor."
