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The "They Wanted It More" expression...

There is one expression that really gets under my skin;

“They wanted it more!”

Did Shrewsbury perform the better than us over the two legs? YES!

And just because they performed better, did Shrewsbury’s players want it more than our players? NO!

I certainly felt we tried over the two legs, but we certainly didn’t lack effort at all. We just lacked crucial killer quality. Shrewsbury simply showed why they have been in an automatic promotion race most this season and why we were in and out of the top six this season. And why we were 16 points behind after 46 games.

Both sets of players were just as desperate to win as each other but Shrewsbury just got to grips with pressure of the occasion better than us. Simple as all that.

No I personally don’t believe in terms of quality we deserved to go through. I am not denying that.

I think it was a great effort in the last ten league games to get ourselves in the top 6 after it seemed to be slipping away after a poor run of form which included Blackpool and Fleetwood. And again after the Scunthorpe loss.

If we had gone up I feel we would have had a lot to do in the transfer market. But with ownership situation and the manager situation maybe even more so.

And going back a few years, talking about the “They wanted it more” expression, as bad as we were bad on the day, never once have I ever believed that Sheffield United wanted it more in the FA Cup 6th round. I was going to put a post at the time about it but with Powelly leaving I got waylaid.

In competitive sport only one person or team can get the prize. Sometimes you perform well and you win and sometimes you lose. Sometimes you don’t perform well for whatever reason and you lose. Sometimes you get lucky and win. That is just sport all over. But in all reality competitors are always as desperate as each to achieve that precious goal.
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Comments

  • One word

    Millwall
  • To say the opposition wanted it more is the easy way out to explain away the problems with our squad.
  • Fully agree in relation to us this season and in particular the play off semi final, but don't agree with the final sentence of that post. Desire often differs between competing sports people and teams and often that does make a huge / the difference. "Wanting it more" is a real thing.
  • "I told them to go out and enjoy themselves "
    Gets right up my hooter.
  • One word

    Millwall

    Sadly in this instance I believe it to be true.
  • edited May 2018
    Baldybonce said:
    “I told them to go out and enjoy themselves,”
    gets right up my hooter.



    So what should I have said to my son and his friends when they went to the park?
  • There's a reason sports psychologists are a thing.

    As far as we are concerned it's not even necessarily about wanting it more, but also confidence and belief. When they scored yesterday we still had nearly 30 minutes to try to pull it back but the belief had gone - the ref might as well have blown up then and there we all knew it was over at that point including the players.
  • There's a reason sports psychologists are a thing.

    As far as we are concerned it's not even necessarily about wanting it more, but also confidence and belief. When they scored yesterday we still had nearly 30 minutes to try to pull it back but the belief had gone - the ref might as well have blown up then and there we all knew it was over at that point including the players.

    Not having scored in 2 1/2 hours against Shrewsbury and needing 2 to just tie, it's not surprising they lost some belief...
  • One word

    Millwall

    No cos they don’t see us as rivals..
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  • Had talksport on commentator said “both teams will want to win this” well yeah I guess so mate it’s a play off semi final.
  • There is one expression that really gets under my skin;

    “They wanted it more!”

    'It is what it is' mate!
  • Be careful what you wish for.
  • I wouldn't accuse any of our squad of not trying. We were bullied a bit, but that doesn't mean they wanted it more. It means there is a fundamental weakness in the team/squad that needs to be addressed for next season.

  • Shit Set piece taking doesn't account for being bullied.

    Every pass the striker receives they have their back to goal.

    Ability to cross from open play.

    All these things need addressing and more.
  • I think there’s games it does apply to, but it’s overused.

    One I don’t like is when the reason we lost is because the players had “no passion”. It’s rarely down to that, missing chances, making mistakes and bad defending isn’t often down to a lack of effort.
  • Yes, agree - there are a few things we need to address.
  • Be careful what you wish for.

    The grass isn’t always greener.

    Better the devil you know.

    Out of the frying pan, into the fire.

    Four favourite phrases those that back RD.
  • Agree - “They wanted it more” is complete crap and just glosses over the shortcomings of one team and/or the abilities of another. I couldn’t attend either leg of the playoffs but my lad did - and commented that the biggest difference he noted were that Shrewsbury’s players were generally much bigger than ours - which gave them a more physical presence on the pitch. It didn’t help that we failed to take them on - but you might argue that given the serial underinvestment of Duchatalet, getting to the playoffs in the first place is a bloody miracle.
    The truthful statement surely is “They were better than us” - and I don’t know why people are afraid of saying that.
  • I don't think they were better - The first goal in the tie was probably the clincher.
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  • I'm sure at this level both sides want to win and have determination belief that they can.
    I think the expression refers to being able to sustain that belief and desire through adversity (e.g. going a goal down, not getting the rub of the green etc).
    Arsene Wenger often uses the expression "we lacked a little bit mental strength".
    Same thing.
    It's about single minded drive to make it happen whatever.
    Which personalities will step up and prevail.
    In short, who wants it more.
  • edited May 2018
    I always take the expression to mean that they were more physical. I expect Shrewsbury were over the moon after the game.
  • edited May 2018
    I think the difference with this thread compared to others is, “They wanted it more!”
  • I wouldn't accuse any of our squad of not trying. We were bullied a bit, but that doesn't mean they wanted it more. It means there is a fundamental weakness in the team/squad that needs to be addressed for next season.

    I think this and that the ref offered our players very little protection in the first half on Sunday.

    Nolan should have had at least one yellow, then you had the Morris elbow and numerous other incidents of over physicality that Shrewsbury dished out. For me the ref bottled a lot of decisions on Sunday.

    Shrewsbury were well organised, broke with pace and deserved their win.
  • Yes, it's a football cliche. Run around like a headless chicken, kick a few people and show how much you want it.
  • DOC64 said:

    I wouldn't accuse any of our squad of not trying. We were bullied a bit, but that doesn't mean they wanted it more. It means there is a fundamental weakness in the team/squad that needs to be addressed for next season.

    I think this and that the ref offered our players very little protection in the first half on Sunday.

    Nolan should have had at least one yellow, then you had the Morris elbow and numerous other incidents of over physicality that Shrewsbury dished out. For me the ref bottled a lot of decisions on Sunday.

    Shrewsbury were well organised, broke with pace and deserved their win.
    I am not saying they didn't deserved win. They did with the quality. Maybe we need that power and pace. But also with a striker who can bag us about 20 or 25 goals. Stefan Payne is their leading scorer with 11. A 20+ scorer and that power and pace should see us top two comfortably.
  • edited May 2018
    DOC64 said:

    I wouldn't accuse any of our squad of not trying. We were bullied a bit, but that doesn't mean they wanted it more. It means there is a fundamental weakness in the team/squad that needs to be addressed for next season.

    I think this and that the ref offered our players very little protection in the first half on Sunday.

    Nolan should have had at least one yellow, then you had the Morris elbow and numerous other incidents of over physicality that Shrewsbury dished out. For me the ref bottled a lot of decisions on Sunday.

    Shrewsbury were well organised, broke with pace and deserved their win.
    The problem for the ref is that a lot of Shrewsbury's challenges were borderline fouls. A completely differnet level, but the Arsenal team with Petite and Viera were masters of this a few years back although their fouls were slightly different in nature, they didn't allow opponents time to settle in midfield. It knocks teams off their stride. The ref gave quite a few as fouls and played a straight bat - but was slow to take action in relation to repeated fouling. I would say from my own observations, about 90% of refs at our level would ref the game in a similar way and we have to adapt accordingly rather than moan about it.
  • "They wanted it more" = comment applied to the opposition in most of Arsenal's northern away games over the past 2 seasons.
  • DOC64 said:

    I wouldn't accuse any of our squad of not trying. We were bullied a bit, but that doesn't mean they wanted it more. It means there is a fundamental weakness in the team/squad that needs to be addressed for next season.

    I think this and that the ref offered our players very little protection in the first half on Sunday.

    Nolan should have had at least one yellow, then you had the Morris elbow and numerous other incidents of over physicality that Shrewsbury dished out. For me the ref bottled a lot of decisions on Sunday.

    Shrewsbury were well organised, broke with pace and deserved their win.
    The problem for the ref is that a lot of Shrewsbury's challenges were borderline fouls. A completely differnet level, but the Arsenal team with Petite and Viera were masters of this a few years back although their fouls were slightly different in nature, they didn't allow opponents time to settle in midfield. It knocks teams off their stride. The ref gave quite a few as fouls and played a straight bat - but was slow to take action in relation to repeated fouling. I would say from my own observations, about 90% of refs at our level would ref the game in a similar way and we have to adapt accordingly rather than moan about it.
    This type of fouling has to be done as a team. If it's shared around then nobody will get booked early for constant offending,
  • edited May 2018
    It's a tough one because we don't know the mentality of the players but I do get the argument.

    But it does exist though. Let's take the Rochdale game, at HT we knew we were heading for the play offs and Rochdale knew they had to score to stay up. So in the second half, yes they did "want it more" and rightly so.

    With regards to the play offs, of course we wanted to win. But let's not kid ourselves, not every single professional footballer is desperate to win every game. If you think of work and our colleagues, how many come to work desperate for the company to succeed and how many come purely because they are getting paid. I realise football is different but I have no doubt we had players on that pitch who weren't particularly bothered about the result. If he had come on, Zyro would have been one of them.
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