Football Resume Example

This comprehensive guide will give you all the tools you need to craft a football resume that positions you strongly against other candidates. The article will take you through the key steps of creating a resume that presents your key skills, qualities and career achievements in a format that employers favor. It will also help you tailor your resume according to your unique skills and experience level. Read on to learn the tips Jobseeker careers experts recommend as the best for your football resume.

Main sections of a soccer player resume

The key sections to include in a football resume are similar to those for any role or profession. If you're lacking relevant work experience, you might choose to add sections that showcase your skill set earlier than in a traditional resume layout. These sections might include projects, education, hobbies and interests, skills and other optional sections.

Your resume layout and structure may differ depending on your experience levels, but make sure your resume includes the following:

Resume Header

In your football resume header, list your name, email address, phone number and address or location. You can also add your LinkedIn, if you have one, to help employers better understand your work history and skills. While in some countries, you might include additional personal information or a photo, these aren't necessary. Be aware of the amount of space your resume header takes up. You don't want your contact details to take space away from the main content of your resume, so keep this section as brief as possible.

Make sure the email address you list in your header is professional-looking and doesn't contain any inappropriate content such as nicknames or unsuitable language. Opt for an email address based on your name or profession, or a combination of both. Finally, check your contact details before sending your resume, to ensure everything's up-to-date.

Resume Summary

Following your resume header, write a resume summary to introduce yourself and showcase some of your key skills and achievements. Alternative names for this section are 'resume objective' and 'personal profile'. While a resume summary focuses on your career experience, a resume objective covers your ambitions and career plans. In addition, your objective should highlight why you're an ideal candidate for football player roles by showing key skills and qualities that reflect the job description.

Alternatively, use this summary to introduce your personal career ambitions and explain why football player roles are a good fit for you at this stage of your career.

A great resume summary should highlight why you're an ideal candidate for football player roles by showing key skills and qualities that reflect the job description and provide evidence to support them. It should also introduce your personality and unique qualities to the reader, to help them start to form an opinion about you as a candidate. See below for some great examples of what to include in your football resume summary.

Conversely, a bad resume summary might be too generic, lacking focus on the specifics of the job description. It will also fail to provide any useful insights on what makes you a unique candidate. See above for some examples of things to avoid when writing your football resume summary.

Skills

In your skills section, list any skills you've acquired or developed that are relevant to football player positions. Consider adding quick decision making, teamwork and collaboration or any other necessary skills for the job. Once more, review the job description and pick out any key football player skills listed that match yours. Focus on these skills and any other key transferable skills that make you a strong candidate for the job.

How to include hard skills on your football resume

For your hard skills list, include any technical abilities or specific industry knowledge that's essential to working as a football player. These could be skills gained through work experience or qualifications. Furthermore, your list of hard skills provides a strong indication to the reader of your expertise in football player roles, and how well you'll fit into the position. If possible, add four or five hard skills that reflect the requirements of the job description. These will boost your chances of success in your applications.

For an effective resume hard skills section, focus on the technical skills that are most essential in the job description, and that match your specific expertise. Some examples of the best hard skills for a football resume are listed below.

Soft skills on your football resume

Soft skills are your transferable skills and personal qualities that make you a good match for a football player position and the organization. Soft skills tend to be more universal than hard skills, and can often apply to multiple jobs and industries. In fact, as technology develops, soft skills are growing in importance for recruiters and employers, so be sure to add several of these to your resume. It's best to aim for four or five soft skills that match the job description and reflect your strongest personal qualities.

The strongest resume soft skills sections include a mix of skills that match your best personal strengths, and that reflect the skills listed in the job description. See below for some examples of effective soft skills for a soccer player resume.

Education

In your education section, include details of your most relevant football player qualifications and educational achievements.

It's not usually necessary to have a degree for jobs as a football player. Nevertheless, it's still crucial to list your highest or most relevant educational achievements. These might include FIFA Medical Diploma, and other certifications or courses that highlight your quick decision making or physical endurance training.

List every relevant qualification, including the name and level of the course, the name of the school, college or university, its location and your graduation date. You can also add some bullet points outlining any high grades, awards you won or specialist subjects you studied. Adding this information will show the employer your dedication to learning and your areas of specialist knowledge.

If you took part in any volunteering or you were a leader or member of any university societies, you could also mention these in your education section.

Certifications and Training

Under certifications and licenses, add any further qualifications that show you're a good fit for the job. These could be official licenses required for the job or certifications that improve your employability. Therefore, include the details of any licenses and professional certifications required for football player roles, along with completion dates so employers can see you're up-to-date.

Review the list below for some suitable certifications for a football resume:

Work Experience

Under your work experience section, add any jobs you've had in the past that are relevant to the position of a football player. List each relevant role in reverse-chronological order starting with your current or most recent role. Add your job title, the organization name, its location and the dates you worked there.

In addition, include a few bullet points under each job, highlighting your key achievements so the hiring manager can see how they led to successful outcomes. Back up each point with evidence to show how you meet the job description.

A successful resume work experience section will always showcase skills and experience relevant to the job description, and how you put each to good use in your previous roles. Offering quantifiable evidence in a soccer player resume proves you're a strong candidate for the job, such as client feedback, project outcomes, KPIs or financial results. There are some examples of strong resume work experience sections below.

The example above can give you some idea of what not to include in your resume work experience section. A poor resume work experience section would typically use vague descriptions of activities in previous jobs, while focusing too much on responsibilities rather than achievements. Failing to focus on the skills and experience that match the job description is likely to harm your chances of success.

Optional Sections

If you need to provide further evidence of your suitability for the job, optional sections can be useful for a soccer player resume. Choose any optional sections that showcase essential or desirable skills or experience for football player jobs.

Hobbies and Interests

Adding your hobbies and interests is a legitimate way of showing off your skills and personal qualities. They also help to show a different side of your personality, and can help your resume create a more memorable impression on hiring managers. If you're short on real world work experience, hobbies and interests can be a useful way of providing more information about your qualities. Only include hobbies and interests that showcase your personality and personal qualities, and add something different to your application.

Voluntary Work

Voluntary work can help you develop useful skills, so it's a valuable addition to your football resume. Write your volunteer section in a similar format to your work experience, including your role, the organization name, relevant dates and the details of your contribution.

References

Standard football player resumes don't tend to include references, but you might find them requested occasionally. Check the job advert to see if you'll need to add references to your resume. Be sure to prepare your referees in advance, so they've agreed to provide a reference and are ready to be contacted.

Best action words for your football resume

Action words can help illustrate to the hiring manager the difference you made in each of your previous jobs. The suggested action verbs below will help the reader to understand your key qualities and the impact you made on the organization.

If you need help creating a resume that impresses HR managers, take a look at Jobseeker's professional resume templates. You can also access beautiful cover letter templates that help your application stand out.

Example resume for football player applications

The football resume example below includes all the sections above, so you can see how a completed resume looks:

Guide to making your resume ATS-friendly

An applicant tracking system (ATS) is just one of the tools employers and recruiters can use to streamline their hiring practices. This typically includes screening candidates by scanning and ranking their resumes based on their likely suitability for any vacancy. When you're writing your football resume, there are several things you can do to make sure your resume stands the best chance of passing the ATS stage.

Follow these guidelines to create the best ATS-friendly resume:

• Choose a resume structure that matches the traditional, reverse-chronological layout or alternatively, the functional resume structure. This should make your resume more readable for ATS applications.
• Use of job description keywords throughout your resume will help it rank higher in the ATS scanning stage, as it will more closely match the requirements laid out in the job description.
• Include clear headings in each section that match the traditional resume structure and format. This will make it easier for the ATS software to scan your resume.
• Use a resume design that includes clean, professional design elements to give your content space to breathe. This might include clear, readable fonts, subtle color accents and simple design elements.
• Use concise language to keep the length of your resume to between one and two pages. This will make it easier to scan for ATS applications.

Key takeaways for your football resume

The best resumes focus on your skills and the value you've added to previous roles, rather than focusing on your duties and responsibilities. Pick a resume format that matches your experience levels, and tailor the content of your resume to reflect the details of the job description.

Jobseeker has a wealth of resume tools, including resume templates and examples, to help you create a winning job application. Sign up today to get started. Jobseeker's expert-designed cover letter generator can help your applications make a strong first impression on hiring managers. Find detailed cover letter examples to complement your resume and get your application noticed.

Sources:

(1) Writing a Resume, California Department of Human Resources: https://www.calhr.ca.gov/employees/Pages/resume-tips.aspx

(2) Resumes, Cover Letters and Job Applications, New York State Department of Labor: https://dol.ny.gov/resumes-cover-letters-and-job-applications