VINCE Lombardi, the celebrated American Football coach, used to say: 'Winning is an all-the-time thing.' And that's the message I will be trying to impress on the TCS Chester Jets players for the rest of the season.

I have to admit I was disappointed with our performance at Milton Keynes on Sunday. Even though we had the more talented players on the floor - I wouldn't swap any one of ours for any of theirs - they outhustled us at the rebounds, where the ball was up for grabs.

But it won't happen again. To be fair, I didn't think we had the rub of the green from the referees, but you have to rise above that, so I am not offering that as an excuse.

I am comfortable with the general attitude of my players, but everyone slips up now and again and I think it was just one of those days for us.

And I must admit I was caught up in the emotion of the game and didn't notice some of the things we were doing wrong, so I am just as much to blame.

In training this week, we have been working on the need to keep hustling and to play for every second of the game. We have watched the tape of the game, but I preferred to concentrate on the tape of the first quarter of our recent BBL Trophy match against Sheffield Sharks, when we took a 32-19 lead. This was our best quarter of the season and I am a firm believer on focusing on positive aspects of the game, not the negative ones.

This was the way to play the game and I will be urging the players to get the message from that performance. We have great experience in our squad and you could say that these are things the players should already know, but I have no doubt that the Jets are hungry for more success - none more than John McCord, who is as competitive as any player I know and typical of the players I try to attract to the club.

You won't find more skilful players in the BBL, but you can't put a price on hustle, as we found out to our cost at Milton Keynes.

The Jets have gained a reputation for providing a springboard for players to move into Europe and it's good to hear two of our old boys are doing well abroad. The ex-Sheffield coach Chris Finch has John Thomas with him at Giessen in the Bundesliga in Germany.

Mookie, who was a great favourite at the Northgate Arena, lit it up in his first game of the season with 29 points in an impressive 98-96 victory over champions Alba Berlin.

And the current BBL player of the year, Kenny Gregory, seems to be enjoying himself in Italy, where he played with Nuova Pallacestro Pavia in Lega Two. He bagged 26 points on the way to a 99-88 road win over Andrea Costa Imola last weekend, to put his team fourth in the table.