IT pays to keep your focus in football, as Northwich Victoria's stadium announcer learned to his cost a couple of years ago when he introduced a minute's silence before an armistice-weekend game with FC United.
Over the Tannoy the chap declared they would be "remembering the servicemen and women of two World Cups…ah, I mean World Wars".
An easy mistake to make.
But if concentration is everything for the man on the mic, the same applies for football teams as they complete their fixtures for each season. The trick is to keep firing to the final whistle of the final game. For sides in mid-table, however, it isn't easy to pull off.
Which brings us to Swansea City, who have just finished a highly creditable ninth in the Premier League despite ending the campaign with a series of indifferent results.
They also bagged the Capital One Cup, of course, a memorable achievement that no doubt helped encourage the idea that the club have just enjoyed their finest ever season.
It is not a claim that can be dismissed lightly, particularly when it is advanced by Alan Curtis, a man who has forgotten more than many people will ever learn about the Swans.
It is easy to be swayed, what with Michu so outstanding and Michel Vorm, Ashley Williams, Ben Davies, Leon Britton and Jonathan de Guzman impressive as well.
At times, the football has been spellbinding, continuing the theme of the Brendan Rodgers era.
But Swansea's best ever season? Well, let's call that debatable.
Michael Laudrup's side finished the league campaign with 46 points, one less than the previous year when they had ended up in 11th position.
The Capital One Cup was won in style.
But if lifting a piece of silverware elevated a season to the level of extraordinary, then FA Cup winners Wigan would still be celebrating instead of morosely contemplating a campaign in the Championship.
Swansea actually finished only ten points — three wins and a draw — above Roberto Martinez's team in the league.
And, call me hard to please, but I just think winning only one out of the final ten matches wasn't the stuff of greatness. The finest side in Swansea's history should surely be better than that.
Accepted, the club had passed the 40-point mark on March 2 and there must have been a temptation to switch off. But, deep down, Laudrup, a man who knows all about high standards, will have been furious.
Curtis is probably too modest to sing the praises of the 1981-82 side that he, Robbie James, Leighton James, Jeremy Charles, Ray Kennedy, Colin Irwin, Dzemal Hadziabdic and others played in.
They actually led the old First Division on four separate occasions and were never out of the top six at any point.
As late as March 20 of that campaign they sat proudly at the top of the league.
And despite tailing off they still managed to reach home in sixth position, winning 21 of their 42 games and ending the term with 69 points. Only three clubs, Liverpool, Bobby Robson's Ipswich and Manchester United, achieved more victories.
Of course the landscape has changed in that the Premier League contains huge inequalities in wealth and power.
But another way of looking at it is to think that outside the top seven in the modern top flight, sides are much of a muchness.
Indeed, just seven points separated Swansea from Sunderland in 17th place.
In the division John Toshack's team competed in, Liverpool and Nottingham Forest had put a steely grip on the European Cup over the previous five seasons, while Aston Villa went on to lift the coveted prize that term. The present-day lot couldn't dream of such dominance.
So it wasn't as if Curtis and Co were up against the Dog & Duck, the Bull's Head and the Frog and Firkin.
Football didn't begin in 1992-93 with the advent of the much-hyped Premier League.
There were some fine teams before then, including Swansea under Toshack. At one point in that remarkable campaign you actually started to believe they were going to win the title.
Memories can play tricks, but Toshack's side were good, very good.
For this column, they are still the gold standard.
