captured by an old Irish proverb which states “ní neart go cur le chéile” or “there is no
strength without unity”. An example of this unity was the extraordinary cohesion of the
victorious European team during its 2002 Ryder Cup golf match against the USA. Thus
according to one of the European players, Darren Clarke, “we played as a team, we dined
as a team, we talked as a team and we won as a team... The team spirit this week has
been the best that I have experienced in this my third Ryder Cup” (cited in O’Sullivan,
2002b, p. 4).
Before we analyse what team spirit means in sport, however, let us pause for a
moment to consider the benefits of teamwork in a rather unusual domain—the animal
kingdom. Have you ever wondered why birds fly in a peculiar “V”-like formation? Well,
according to Mears and Voehl (1994), this pattern is adaptive because as each bird in the
“V” flaps its wings, it creates an “uplift” current for the bird behind it. This uplift enables
the entire flock of birds to fly significantly farther than any of the individual birds could
fly alone. But how can this idea of synergy among flocks of bird apply to sports
behaviour? In order to answer this question, we need to analyse what team spirit or
cohesion means to athletes, coaches and sport psychologists.
Athletes’ and coaches’ views on cohesionAs the quotations at the beginning of this chapter indicate, cohesion is valued highly by
coaches and sports performers. More significantly, many team managers believe that it
can be enhanced. For example, Sam Torrance, the manager of the European Ryder Cup
golf team in 2002, sought advice from two successful soccer managers—Sir Alex
Ferguson (manager of Manchester United) and Sven-Göran Eriksson (coach of England)
(R.Williams, 2002a)—in an effort to enrich the task and social cohesion of his players
before the match. Apparently, the key message delivered by these managers was to treat
all the golfers in the team in the same way (R.Williams, 2002c). This principle was
appreciated greatly by the players. For example, in commenting on Torrance’s captaincy,
Pádraig Harrington said, “everybody got the same treatment, there were no stars in the
team...he kept the spirits up all the way” (cited in Reid, 2002, p. 22). By contrast with
this egalitarian approach, Curtis Strange, the captain of the US team, showed evidence of
preferential treatment for certain players. For example, he allowed Tiger Woods to
engage in his customary early morning practice round on his own before the match
whereas he insisted that the other players had to practise together. Interestingly, recent
research on university athletes suggests that perceived inequity, or favouritism on the part
of coaches towards certain individuals, decreased team cohesion (Turman, 2003).
Exploring team cohesion in sport: a critical perspective 187