It's been said a thousand times before that a team with nothing to play for will have their minds elsewhere as the season plays out, whilst their manager insists he wants his players to keep going and end the campaign on a high.
That is the situation facing Exeter City now, who are safe from relegation and have no chance of making the play-offs. In-house targets such as beating last year’s 56-point total and finishing in the top ten have been set, but it doesn’t really matter if the Grecians achieve that or not.
Of course, it would be nice and that is the challenge facing Gary Caldwell and his players. But after the traumas of their pre-Christmas spell, where the Grecians endured that wretched run of one win in 16 matches – and that an EFL Trophy win against a very youthful Swindon Town side – then maybe the players have earnt the right to rest on their laurels and start planning for their summer break.
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That said, Tuesday’s outstanding performance at Leyton Orient suggests there is no such complacency creeping in and the focus is still very much on football right now. A draw at relegation-threatened Port Vale today would equal last season’s points total, while a win would surpass it in what has turned out to be a pretty good season at St James Park.
“I think, with this group, you’ve seen on Tuesday night that that wasn’t the case,” Caldwell said. “I thought, first half, the game had a little bit of a feel of ‘can I end the season?’ But second half, they put everything in to get something from the game.
“That is the challenge of our group. What do we want to be? I think it’s easy to motivate yourself when you’re playing for something, a promotion or to stay in the league. Now, it’s that intrinsic motivation; why do we play football? Why do we want to be at this football club? What do we want this football club to represent?
“I think we’re playing for a lot more now in the next three games in terms of what we want to be, not just this season but moving forward into next season as well.”
Caldwell is certainly using these last games of the season with an eye or more on next year. Alex Hartridge was given a farewell appearance at home to Stevenage recently, while 16-year-old Jake Richards is getting minutes to further his development. Whether he is involved today remains to be seen after he was forced off at Leyton Orient with tight calves.
There are other injury issues as well, including Sonny Cox, who will not play again this season after being forced off in that Stevenage game with a hamstring issue.
“We have a few bumps and bruises,” Caldwell said. “I’m not 100% sure. We were off (on Wednesday) as we didn’t get back (from Orient) until 4.30am, so the boys were off.
“I’ve not seen Jack (Aitchison), but he could be struggling; Vinnie Harper came off with a hamstring problem that hopefully is OK. We kind of took that precaution, but we’ll see how he is and Jake’s calves were tight at half-time.
“Again, we took him off as a precaution but hopefully he’s OK and Reece (Cole) is still carrying a little niggle in his back, hopefully he’s OK. We’ll kind of go through everyone today, some will recover, some will train and then full preparation will go in tomorrow to get the boys ready to go and win on Saturday.”
While City have nothing to play for, Vale are fighting for their lives after a 3-0 defeat at Peterborough on Wednesday saw them fall into the relegation zone.
“They’ve got so much to play for,” Caldwell said. “We have to make sure our motivation is high and higher than theirs to give us a chance to win the game.
“We can’t go there and think we can just go and play our game and think we can get a win. We have to be aggressive, we have to have a mentality to give everything to fight for the three points because we know they have so much at stake and so much to play for.
“We have to, in the coming days, build that up amongst ourselves and like I said aim for the top half, aim for more points than last year and find that motivation to go and win.”
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