My middle child (8) is a peach. Smart kid, hard work ethic but is the classic wilt under pressure/take a backseat to kids he feels are better than him and shrinks when he plays with better competition. His technical ability is at or beyond almost every other kid at the club in his age bracket but when the lights get turned on, he often did not impose himself on the game, playing quite conservatively. Never losing the ball because he has great foot skills but not often making an impression on the game either. Especially defensively. This also all is at club, rec soccer he dominates, when it's easy for him and he is clearly the best the majority of games.
As such he has been on the B team at his club and was offered a spot on the B team again next year. He hugely wants to be on the A team with some of his other friends (though he has friends on B too). For years I've smiled and said the lines... "Did you have fun pal?" and carried on, even if watching him jog alongside attackers and never put a foot in killed me. He watches soccer almost every day, plays with me in the yard, wants to watch IG clips of his favorite players, collects cards and on and on. He practices every day on his own for at least 30 minutes.
At club soccer this week he exploded, 5 goals in the first half of the first game and ended with 8. They weren't (all) selfish dribble through the whole team goals either, one was a Up-Back-Through where he made a third man run and got rewarded with a good pass. One was free kick from midfield he asserted himself to take (he would often give it up even if he won it, despite practicing them in the backyard for hours and having the best leg on the team). I haven't actually gone to training this week because of work, his mum took him but he came home each day saying he scored multiple times, beat specific kids (A team kids he thought were too good) in 1v1s etc... Telling me the kids told him they thought he could play on their level. I just smiled and told him, "I've always told you how good you are, I'm glad you're realizing it!"
I know this is just a peak and there will be lots more valleys for him, maybe even this season where he loses confidence again but if you have a kid like that just stick in there. There's no better feeling than when you things click and your soccer obsessed kid lights up.
I really hope he is learning a valuable life skill about positive mindset and self-belief from all this. In the meantime, I'll keep asking "Did you have fun pal?"