Photo: Paul Zammit Cutajar

The recent humiliating debacle against Gibraltar, the minnows of minnows in international football, has shocked us all revealing a very obvious lacuna that has surfaced inour DNA – we have ceased tobe competitive.

We do not stream classes because the weaker ones may be discouraged; we do not publish and exhibit examination results as the failures may be hurt; students refrain from receiving their hard-earned school prizes because they would be called “nerds”.

Inter-school football leagues have been scrapped completely because they are competitive and this may create tension. We are continually pampering and wrapping our children in cotton wool rather than pit them to face the rough and tumble life of our youth.

The affable Dave Hemery, winner of the 400m hurdles at the 1968 Mexico Olympic Games, with whom I spent many happy hours at the Sporting Excellence Centre at Bisham Abbey, related to me his studies in his book The Pursuit of Excellence.

It evolves from his reflections about his own Olympic performance followed by his research to find any common factor among the world’s greatest achievers.

Intensity of training and the competitive edge “to strive, to fight and not to yield” emerged as the most important ingredients.