Bad attitudes

So, the NZ athletes aren’t bringing home as many medals from the Commonwealth Games as we thought they might. I turn on the TV, and members of the public are berating them.

“We just don’t seem to have that winning attitude, like Australia”

“They’re just not trying hard enough”

Excuse me, People-who-were-dawdling-around-somewhere-long-enough-to-talk-to-a-TV-crew, but when was the last time you put all your heart and soul into training and did well enough to represent your country? How dare these non-athletes dare to criticise the efforts of our team. Of course they want to win. Of course they are trying their best. As if they would go to compete thinking, “you know, I’m just going to go with the flow, and I don’t care about winning for my country”.

On the Aussie issue – there’s no point making the comparison. Not only is their country far bigger than ours in terms of geography and population, the sporting infrastructure is far more advanced. There’s no way we should expect to measure up to their standards. And our standards should not be measured on some medal tally predictions. It should be measured on the pride of our athletes, competing for NZ and reaching their personal potential. Let’s support them as best we can, no matter where they end up finishing.