100%

[K23]

A few years ago on MoTD, I saw Alan Shearer telling off one of his co-pundits in no uncertain terms for praising one of the teams for giving 100%. Shearer's point was that any professional footballer or team should be giving 100% every time they were on the pitch and it struck me that he was right, they should do that for professional pride at the very least let alone the ridiculous amount of money they were being paid.

So, was the Swans performance against Cardiff the 100% bar for our team? I certainly hadn't seen a better one for quite some time but surely the purpose of the coaching staff is to get the team playing as close to their 100% potential as possible every game and certainly not less than 90%. Maybe it is statistically unlikely that every single player can be at 95% of their potential or better all at the same time but now we know what 100% looks like, are we entitled to judge the team, every player and the coaching staff against that performance? And if that was 100%, then what on earth was that 25% performance 6 days earlier against Bristol City and who was responsible for it?

If we can play like that once, then we should be able to replicate it at least, say, 30 times over a season like more successful teams do and even if there are inevitably games we play like that but don't win, it should still give a platform to amass something like 100 points and a realistic stab at promotion. I have been dissatisfied with a lot of the performances this season, but now I know what our potential is, I'm even more dissatisfied with those performances because at the time, I had thought, that's where we are as a team and I now know we've been playing most of our games in neutral instead of in the higher gears. The saddest part is, all those lacklustre performances were starting to become acceptable because it seemed like that was the best we could do. It isn't.

 

[Itchysphincter]

The occasion counts. It’s human nature. The only thing it tells us is that they are capable of it, not that they can do it every week.

 

[100percentjack]

The occasion counts. It’s human nature. The only thing it tells us is that they are capable of it, not that they can do it every week.

It’s what the top teams do. If they are capable of a performance like that against Cardiff, then they ought to be able to produce the same performance against say… QPR, Sheff Weds, Rotherham etc. they are well payed professional sportsmen.

Yes, derby rivalry will up the ante, but the players & staff have a job to do and that is to apply themselves to the best of their ability to each & every match day. I am encouraged by their efforts since LW was appointed the improvement has been very noticeable… even against the top teams (like Leicester). I’m feeling positive.

 

[LeonWasTheDogs]

The occasion counts. It’s human nature. The only thing it tells us is that they are capable of it, not that they can do it every week.

Yep. It’s not just determined by human nature, but also by all the other crap they have to put up with. It’s a long season, they’ll have to deal with fatigue, niggling injuries, illness, lack of sleep because of a young kid or Mrs being ill, etc….

So yes, everyone isn’t going to be 100% all of the time. The aim is to get as many as possible as close to 100% as often as possible. And that’s the start - then all the work on shape, triggers and how to respond to certain situations all has to come in and be spot on.

 

[bakajack]

The problem with that is that by that nature you should be expecting the other team to also be pushing out 80-90% of their potential the vast majority of games. There is an element of rock paper scissors tactically which has a huge bearing on a team's ability to have the opportunity to bring out that potential.

Managers rarely get it super right while the other side get it super wrong to the extent that we were able to not only show our best side but also with the other team giving us so little to worry about that we could focus on the attacking side of our game.

You could argue that in most of our games lately where we have won that rock paper scissors we have shown 80%+ of our potential and usually scored at least one if not two goals. In most of those cases when managers on both sides made changes that opportunity for showing potential was reduced/nullified but we had still done enough to get 1 or 3 points.

 

[monmouth]

Life is more important than lunch.

That game was a one off with no 'we go again' drivel available if they'd lost. Wurzels could be covered with 'we'll get it right next week'. They just HAD to win that game. Think of your own job and when you put in maximum effort and when you coast. They are the same. Add in the crowd, which was also 100% and otherwise never is over 30% (same could be said...why not?) and that was never a benchmark in a million years. I'd be surprised if we see that again this season, unless we have a relegation shoot out against Millwall.

Plus if they come up against a team that needs the result more than us, they won't have a supine, talentless, shat the bed Cardiff garbage to deal with, and that is a different kettle of bananas.