Silver medal is good enough, who cares if it is gold?

Singapore women table tennis coach Liu Guodong told the press that the Singapore women table tennis team has very slim chances of beating the China’s team in the final women table tennis team event match. I guess we all know that this is a fact however I feel this statement should not come from the Coach to the press during the crucial match leading to the final team event show-down between China and Singapore.

This remark was made after the Singapore women team’s successful match against the South Korean in the semifinal event competition. I wonder what kind of signal was Coach Liu giving to his team by saying that they have slim chances if any of beating the China’s team for the gold medal. Perhaps Coach Liu is telling the Singapore team that it is ‘okay’ to loose and that the Singapore team is no match for the China team anyway.
Perhaps Coach Liu spoke in good faith and was trying to reduce the pressure to the team who just overcome the mighty South Korean team. Perhaps Coach Liu is trying to signal to the China team that Singapore team is the underdog and has nothing to loose by pitting against the world number 1. Well we all by now that the China team outclass and outmatch the Singapore team.

Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant once made the following remark.
It is not the will to win, but the will to prepare to win that makes the difference.

It seems Coach Liu has throw in the towel even before the final’s team event match against China. As a matter of fact Coach Liu even had the audacity to say he has accomplished his task of training and leading the team to obtain Olympic medals for Singapore. True but is that good enough? The China teams never come with the mentality of being the 2nd best. It is either the gold medal or never.
It is like the mentality of 'silver medal is good enough, who cares if it is gold?'

Furthermore there are plenty of mistakes made by Singapore women table tennis team during the matches that I wonder if our taxes are well utilized and well spend on the team.