The role of ankle mobility in a footballer’sperformance

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By Pablo Dip - Método PD

Everything starts from the ground. And what connects you to the ground is your foot and ankle.

In football we talk a lot about power, speed and explosive strength. And rightly so, because

that’s what wins matches. But few people look at the first link in the chain: the ankle-foot

complex, the only point of contact between your body and the ground. Every sprint, every

deceleration, every change of direction and every jump starts there. If that base fails,

everything you build on top of it fails with it.

What the ankle does in every action of the game

The quality that matters most is dorsiflexion: the ability of the knee to travel forward past

the toes while the heel stays on the ground. It’s the movement you make when you brake,

when you absorb a landing or when you squat down.

When that dorsiflexion is good, the ankle absorbs force and returns it; it can cushion a

significant part of the energy of every landing. When it’s poor, that energy doesn’t

disappear: it travels up the chain and is paid for by other structures that aren’t designed for

it (Fong et al., 2011).

The evidence in footballers is clear:

• Worse landing control. The lower the dorsiflexion, the more landing errors during

football-specific tasks. Ankle mobility can explain around 20% of landing quality: a lot

for a single variable.

• Better performance with more mobility. A greater range is associated with better

vertical jump and better jump tests, because it reduces ground contact time and

improves force production.

• Football tends to take mobility away from you. Footballers often show less

dorsiflexion than the general population, and that range drops over the course of the

season. If you don’t train it, you lose it.

The foot: the other half of the base

Talking only about the ankle means stopping halfway. The ankle doesn’t work alone: it works

together with the foot, and the foot is much more than a passive platform.

Research now describes the “foot core system” (McKeon et al., 2015): just as your core

stabilizes your trunk, the foot has its own stability core. It works through three parts that

operate together: the passive one (bones, plantar fascia and ligaments that form the arch),

the active one (the intrinsic musculature of the foot) and the neural one (the information

coming from the sole). The receptors in the sole and those muscles are the main source of

information for detecting changes in posture, and they allow the foot to react quickly to

stabilize the ankle and maintain balance.

In plain terms: a strong, “awake” foot supports the arch, controls pronation and gives the

ankle a stable base to move from. A sleepy or weak foot leaves the ankle working alone, and

that’s where problems begin. That’s why, when I talk about stability, I talk about ankle-foot

stability as a unit, not the ankle in isolation.

The link almost no one makes: the ankle-foot and the knee

Here’s the important part to understand that this isn’t only about performance, but about

prevention.

When the ankle lacks dorsiflexion, the body looks for that movement somewhere else. The

foot overpronates, the tibia rotates inward, the knee caves inward… and dynamic knee

valgus appears: that knee that collapses toward the center on landing or braking. This

pattern is one of the mechanisms most associated with knee injuries, including the anterior

cruciate ligament (Lima et al., 2018).

The chain is one single unit: if one joint loses mobility, the one next to it pays the bill. A stiff

or unstable ankle-foot isn’t a local problem: it’s a knee problem waiting to happen.

The good news works the other way too. Ankle mobility programs of just a few weeks

improved range and reduced knee valgus angles by between 20% and 50% on landing

and cutting. Working on the base changes what happens higher up.

How it fits into the way I work

This is a good example of my method in general: goals are built in order, like a pyramid. First

I secure the base —mobility and good ankle-foot stability— and only on top of that do I load

control, strength and power applied to the sporting movement. Adding strength on top of a

stiff or unstable ankle-foot means accelerating toward injury. The order isn’t a detail: it’s

what makes the work last.

Mini test: how’s your dorsiflexion?

You can do a rough test at home, known as the knee-to-wall test:

1. Stand facing a wall, barefoot.

2. Place the tip of your foot about 10 cm from the wall (measure it).

3. Without lifting your heel off the ground, drive your knee forward trying to touch the wall.

4. Does the knee touch without the heel lifting? Good sign.

5. Doesn’t reach, or the heel lifts? You probably have limited dorsiflexion on that side.

6. Repeat with the other foot and compare. A marked difference between sides is as

important as the lack of range itself.

An extra for the foot: standing and barefoot, try to “shorten” the foot by drawing the base of

your toes toward the heel without curling your toes, lifting the arch. If you struggle to hold it

or don’t know how to activate it, your foot core needs work.

These tests don’t replace a professional assessment, but they give you a first clue. If you

can’t reach, or if one side is much worse than the other, that’s the signal to work on the

base before adding more load.

Conclusion

The ankle and the foot aren’t the glamorous part of training, but they’re where everything

starts. Good ankle mobility and a stable ankle-foot base improve your landing, your jump

and your change of direction, and protect your knees from the compensations that end in

injury.

Build from the ground up. It’s the only way for what’s on top to hold.

Want to know how your base is doing and build on it properly? Write to me and we’ll set up

your initial assessment.