Before last Sunday's encounter with Houston Dynamo at Arrowhead Stadium, Kansas City Wizards head coach Curt Onalfo laid out the team's overall goal for the middle third of the season -- improvement.
"We want to do a little bit better this next 10 games of the season than we did the first 10 games of the season and just concentrate on our performances and getting better each day ... let's make sure we make a commitment to ourselves and to each other to be better," he said.
It will be difficult for the Wizards to improve upon their 6-2-2 record accomplished in the first 10 matches, but there is room. Still, a close reading of Onalfo's words reveal that results are not the sole goal.
"I'm going to say it until I'm blue in the face: We're not going to get caught up in the result. At the end of the day, we played a good soccer game today," Onalfo said after the Wizards' 1-0 loss to Houston.
Following a second consecutive loss for the Wizards, the thoughts seem contradictory in what is a results-oriented business. If teams don't win, they aren't considered successful, much like a business that doesn't turn a healthy profit.
"You have to figure out -- how do you get to the result? It's like a business. Why does Wal-Mart make a lot of money? Because they want to make a lot of money? No. Because they have a good business plan. You have to pay attention to the process," said Onalfo. " ... At the end of the day, if you do things right and concentrate on the little things and continue to progress and get better and better, the results are going to fall your way."
Patience can be tested with such a philosophy but a lack of patience after a disappointing result can be far more damaging.
"If you just worry about losing that game 1-0, you go in at the end of the game and you scold your team," said Onalfo. "Our team died on the field; they gave everything they had. Their heart was left on the field.
"Our record could be a heck of a lot better than it is. And if I look at the games we didn't get the result I believe we should have, and [if I] had taken a really negative attitude towards them, then my team doesn't respond properly."
An emotional roller-coaster where a team's mood, motivation, and mojo are impacted with each win, loss, or draw can soon lead to burnout. Looking at each performance is then not shortsighted but rather a big-picture approach.
"When I say I'm not going to look at the result, yeah, at the end of the day, you look at the result, but, more importantly, we're looking at the performance," Onalfo said. "If you do things right, the results end up falling your way more often than not, and that's what has happened so far."
Midfielder Sasha Victorine, now in his eighth MLS season, agrees.
"Curt said it right: it's not the pressure of necessarily the result, it's playing well and getting the way in which we want to play," said Victorine. "We know if we play well, we're going to win more games than we lose and do a lot better than some people expected at the beginning of the season."
Right now, the Wizards are in a strong position to not only make the MLS Cup Playoffs after missing them the last two years, but to contend for the Eastern Conference title. Only strong performances will take Kansas City through to the ultimate goal.
"The next time we win, I'm going to say the same thing. I've been saying it all along," Onalfo said. "There are things that we have to do better and there are things we [are doing] well and we're going to harp on that."
Robert Rusert is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
