It is impossible to understate the impact sports has on the mental well-being of Sports Personalities worldwide. Motlatla Khabo is no anomaly in the many sports personalities whose passion for physical well-being becomes motivation to perfect the skill they have.
He plays not one but three different sports and he continues to woo crowds in all three. At 22, Motlatla shows no sign of ever slowing down. He attests that his love for sports is enough fuel to keep him going despite the challenges he faces.
Motlatla’s love for sports started with one soccer ball. Like every boy, when he was little, he played football as frequently as possible. He loved the adrenaline rush that came with scoring a goal.
For him, soccer is not just about running around the field chasing one small ball. To him, soccer is an opportunity to sharpen mental agility because it requires fast thinking as well as precision to know where to pass the ball and even how to do it.
For Motlatla, playing soccer was always an opportunity to train his brain to think faster and that is what made him play the sport. He carried on to play in his teens where he now focused on learning how to dribble, how to run and most importantly, how to score.
Motlatla still plays soccer today and is still one of the best players among his peers. Although he has not pursued any national opportunities that are linked to soccer, he definitely would have a lot to offer any national team if he did.
The second sport that Mr. Khabo plays is handball. Although this is a very unpopular sport, in 2015 when he started playing, he was mainly driven by curiosity. He wanted to train his hands to be as good as his feet.
Handball taught him a lot about balance and mental focus. Moreover, this sport was an opportunity to improve his upper body strength and most importantly, it improved his accuracy. After proving to be competent in this sport, Khabo was selected to represent Lesotho at a tournament that was held in 2018 at Zambia.
The last and final sport played by this young man is cricket. He started playing in 2018 and has since become consistent in perfecting his craft. It was from this sport that he learnt to master hand and eye coordination that are beneficial to him in all the sports he plays.
To him, cricket is not just about batting and throwing a ball. It is mostly about developing patience and virtues such as persistence because it is very easy to make one mistake that could cost one’s team a win.
He believes that if sports were a test of character, then cricket has to be the finest test out of all the sports he plays. It has trained him in ways that he never thought and taught him valuable life lessons such as endurance, good sportsmanship as well as planning articulate moves.
Although his journey has had twists and turns, the most impressive quality in this young man is his desire to learn. Many people his age feel that they have things figured out but this young man is a testament that one’s life only becomes more inspiring if they remain teachable. He is definitely an inspiration to many and we wish him the very best in his journey ahead!