The Winning Mentality

As next season’s signings continue to be announced, so too are the assurances that many of them ‘know how to win’, ‘are used to winning’, and ‘have helped their team to victory.’ What exactly does that mean? Are fans to breathe a sigh of relief that next season’s potential heroes have discovered the secret of trying scoring more goals than the other team?

Adam Calder is probably the most successful player of the Elite league era. Did he ‘know how to win?’ or was he just a very good player who has played in some strong, well-coached Coventry Blaze teams?

Matus Petricko won the playoffs in 2006 with Newcastle, and then Nottingham the following year. Was this because he was ‘used to winning’? His unspectacular, if solid, season in Cardiff the next year would suggest not. If he did have the winning formula, it evaded him when the Devils came up against a stronger Sheffield Steelers side in that year’s semi final.

Incredibly, Bruce Richardson had not won a trophy until last season. It’s especially curious as he is the sort of player that the phrase is used to describe (tenacious, gritty, a leader) but, almost inexplicably, found trophies hard to come by in his career.

Perhaps he could take lessons from James Pease – a player who has won 8 league titles, 4 playoff titles and 2 Challenge Cups. Does this make him more likely to be a key part of a championship winning side that Richardson?

‘The winning mentality’ is a description often used by teams who hope to end a slightly barren run and want to keep their fans positive. By adding ‘proven winners’ teams can claim to have found the missing ingredient to their squad. This year we’ve cracked it, we’re going all the way.

I’m being a bit churlish and unfair; the task of writing press released for new signings or re-signings is not an enviable one. Every signing that a team makes, be that a new player or a re-signing, needs to be celebrated. There are only so many ways to say, ‘X has signed for us and we’re happy.’

When having to write approximately eighteen such statements per team, per season, it is inevitable that they will slip into cliché and empty platitudes. What this particular platitude means, of course, is a player who can handle pressure and in a key moment is unlikely to make a mistake and find the key pass or shot; a player who is mentally strong and will roll up his sleeves and grind out a victory when required.

The problem is that such phrases can become overused by being applied to any player who won the playoffs with his side last year.

Ultimately, we can’t know how well a player will do when they sign. There are so many variations that even a well-known player on these shores may fail to meet expectations, let alone somebody completely new to the league. All that a press release can do is be positive and try to get fans excited by the signing. The downside is that they will become desensitised to glowing appraisals of players after being told eighteen times that a signing will help bring them the success that they crave.

The hyperbole is understandable but it would be refreshing to hear ‘Y is meant to be a nice bloke and turns up for training on time. He scored pretty well last year and falls under our budget, so fingers crossed’ or the even less likely, ‘Hopefully he should be passable in this league and has offered to pay for his own sticks, so we could probably do worse.’

Belfast	v	Cardiff
4th February 2012 19:00
Braehead	v	Edinburgh
4th February 2012 19:00
Nottingham	v	Dundee
4th February 2012 19:00
Sheffield	v	Hull
4th February 2012 19:00
Coventry	v	Fife
4th February 2012 19:30
Sheffield	v	Belfast
5th February 2012 17:00

Hull	2-8	Coventry
3rd February 2012 19:30
Fife	2-3	Braehead
1st February 2012 19:15
Dundee	1-4	Fife
29th January 2012 18:30
Hull	2-1	Cardiff
29th January 2012 18:00
Coventry	1-6	Nottingham
29th January 2012 18:00
Edinburgh	3-6	Sheffield
29th January 2012 18:00

	Club	GP	W	L	OL	GF	GA	Pts
1	Belfast Giants	39	31	8	3	159	80	65
2	Nottingham Panthers	39	29	10	2	176	85	60
3	Sheffield Steelers	33	29	4	0	128	73	58
4	Coventry Blaze	39	24	15	1	147	112	49
5	Cardiff Devils	37	20	17	9	119	103	49
6	Braehead Clan	38	21	17	2	141	123	44
7	Hull Stingrays	40	11	29	4	107	162	26
8	Edinburgh Capitals	38	11	27	3	89	170	25
9	Fife Flyers	37	7	30	5	76	166	19
10	Dundee Stars	38	6	32	5	87	155	17

Bracknell	v	Telford
4th February 2012 18:00
Basingstoke	v	Swindon
4th February 2012 18:30
Slough	v	Guildford
4th February 2012 18:30
Milton Keynes	v	Manchester
4th February 2012 19:00
Sheffield	v	Peterborough
4th February 2012 19:30
Manchester	v	Swindon
5th February 2012 17:30

Basingstoke	5-4	Slough
29th January 2012 18:00
Peterborough	3-2	Bracknell
29th January 2012 17:30
Sheffield	4-2	Swindon
29th January 2012 17:30
Telford	5-4	Guildford
29th January 2012 17:30
Milton Keynes	1-5	Basingstoke
28th January 2012 19:00
Slough	5-2	Peterborough
28th January 2012 18:30

	Club	GP	W	L	OL	GF	GA	Pts
1	Guildford Flames	36	24	12	3	163	105	51
2	Slough Jets	35	23	12	1	160	112	47
3	Manchester Phoenix	37	22	15	3	136	119	47
4	Sheffield Steeldogs	37	21	16	4	116	101	46
5	Milton Keynes Lightning	35	22	13	1	113	92	45
6	Basingstoke Bison	36	20	16	2	130	119	42
7	Swindon Wildcats	37	15	22	5	119	123	35
8	Bracknell Bees	36	12	24	8	106	142	32
9	Peterborough Phantoms	36	13	23	2	115	155	28
10	Telford Tigers	37	9	28	2	100	190	20

	Club	GP	W	L	OL	GF	GA	Pts

	Club	GP	W	L	OL	GF	GA	Pts

	Club	GP	W	L	OL	GF	GA	Pts

	Club	GP	W	L	OL	GF	GA	Pts

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