Losing is a reality of sport in general, but it's also the reality of life. We don't always win and one of the things that I find challenging is that players always have the expectation of winning. One of the things we need to do as coaches, parents and athletes is take the expectation away, because the reality is that with two players on a court (or if you're playing doubles and there's 2 vs 2)...
"You're a 50% chance of losing every single time you walk on the court."
You're a 50% chance of winning also, and there's no guarantee in this sport. It doesn't matter what your ranking is or you know what happened yesterday or what happened the day before, or if you've played them once before. The reality is no matter who you play you are only a 50% chance of winning that match. The reality of losing is really important because we need to teach our players, our athletes that losing is okay. Failing is okay, making mistakes is okay, because that's how we learn, that's what motivates us.
When we lose a match we are so driven to not let that happen again because the feelings of losing are not what we want to feel on a regular basis as a player. When I was playing as a junior, I knew a losing felt like. I know what losing feels like, it's not it's enjoyable. The car ride home with mum and dad is not enjoyable, but the reality is that it's going to happen and we need to equip ourselves and equip our athletes with the tools to be able to deal with losing. And then obviously when you do lose it's about taking the learnings from the losses and turning them into positive scenarios moving forward.
You take the lessons you learn. You don't make the same mistakes again. You practice, you train and you get better. So the next time you play that same player, that same opponent, you have a much better chance of winning the match.
If we can learn that losing is reality and take away our expectations, you take away the pressure that you put on yourself each time you walk on the court. Be desperate to win, be desperate to fight, be desperate to compete, but the reality is no matter what the situation when you walk on that court, it's 50% chance.