Goals/Success

As the domestic football season is finishing for a another season I found a few things interesting.

Take a look at Arsenal for example they arguably had a poor league season, lost a fair few games and didn’t finish high enough at all for a team of their standard. At the beginning of the season their target was to secure a top 4 and with it Champions League football. They ended up finishing 8th while losing 10 games along the way. Now that could be deemed a bad season to most people, remember this is a club that went a whole season undefeated so they set their standards high. However, with an FA Cup win it will now be seen as a good season overall, they have achieved success. They set out to win a trophy and this was achieved, so they attained their goal of silverware.

While they had setbacks and didn’t win week in week out, this didn’t take them away from their goal and what they wanted to achieve. It’s important to remember to achieve our goal there will be hard times as well as good.

When you look back at the season 2019/20 you will not look at the 10 defeats and finishing 8th but will see the FA Cup winners 2020. Arsenal through a tricky season achieved a major goal.

You can look at the other end of the table at Aston Villa in the bottom three for most of the season and lost a lot of games. They lost 21 of their 38 games so the players and fans were seeing their team suffer defeat more often than not. You could say they were failing most weeks, you can also look at their mindset that they could bounce back from that many defeats and still know they could and would achieve their goal.

Villa’s success wasn’t based on weekly results or even monthly results. They had the end goal in sight and knew they would suffer defeat and tough times to achieve their overall goal. So after a long season of setbacks and defeats they found a way to get the results to stay up. They knew the bigger picture, they stayed on course and the manager, players and fans always believed this would be achieved. It’s important to remember you will suffer defeats but remaining focused and on course is so important if you are to achieve your goal.

Aston Villa had more defeats then weekly success but they did achieve their Goal of staying up.

I even watched Barnsley stay up by winning their last two games of the season with late goals and drama. The players and the staff were so happy, you could see the excitement and togetherness with the team knowing they are all on the same course delivering on the goal they set out as a collective. If you have a spare 5 minutes watch the reaction of their players and staff in the last 2 games of the season, you can see their joy shared together.

Let’s not forget these players had been losing most weeks with 21 defeats in 46 games, they could easily of let their heads drop and accepted there were going down. They were used to losing and not getting the right weekly results. But the right mentality and them believing in the same goal helped drive them to safety. On face value you would think this was a poor season and they didn’t have success or achieve their goal. It’s not always about the top prize and this is a great example of showing you should celebrate all goals you achieve however big or small they might be.

So after many weekly setbacks and defeats Barnsley achieved their goal of staying up.

So are we all quick to judge short term results in our day to day jobs and lives? Are we are all looking for that instant success story? We do have to go through tough times to get there but also to appreciate what we have achieved.

So are we looking at our goals/Success with Long term or short term vision?

You could have set backs and defeats but does it take you away from your end goal and the success you are looking for. I have had many over my career and found I learn more from set-backs and defeats more than the success. Just like the famous saying, you win or you learn!

I think we all should take a step back and evaluate ours weeks, but remember it was just one week. What could we learn from and how could we improve on this the following week or month. We could be an FA cup win away or one win from safety for another season and ultimate success.

Let’s judge results over a period of time not short term success.

Remember believe in your goals, focus on them and do not let a bad week take you off track.

What are your goals for your next ‘season’.

Comment below