How we became a better basketball team.

Situations or tasks that involve teams often depend on the interrelationships of individual for its success. I realised this when I was in school. I was involved in many team sports like volleyball, basketball and cricket. My school life revolved around sports and studies played second fiddle to it. I was passionate about sports but the sport closest to my heart was basketball. I started paying basketball when I was in sixth standard and soon became part of the senior team. Though we had very good players and looked a solid team on paper, but somehow the performance of the team did not live up to expectations in matches. The sport basketball demands great level of team coordination, which was missing in our team. Though each one of us knew that we needed to play as a team but we did not implement it on the field. As the captain of the team that became a big worry for me. I tried to analyse the reasons behind these symptoms in order to discover the problem. The problem was simple, which is quite common across all of us. All of them longed for appreciation and recognition from the coach. Somehow my coach and I over emphasised the task and ignored their needs. The problem was not that the coach was frugal in recognising our performance. But the fact that aggravated the problem further was that the coach was biased towards me or seemed so to other players of the team. This was mainly because I was the only player in the team who had played nationals. However, that did not mean that the other players in the team were in any way inferior. All of us were equally good. I realised that the situation needed to be corrected. The thing that further hampered our interpersonal relationships was that this excessive appreciation directed at me made it difficult for them to trust me. This trust was very important because basketball is a game that requires coordination. Just one player can not make baskets. All the players of the team move together.

I felt that discussing this problem with the coach might disturb him because that will require him to change his thinking and also he might look at it as a challenge to his wisdom. So, I started pushing the other players forward in the eyes of my coach. I started appreciating them not only during matches but also during practice sessions. They finally started trusting me. They saw that I was with them and recognised their skills. This trust was evident from their actions and changed body language. They started coming to me with their problems. We also started going out together after school. This was something that was not happening earlier. My coach also started recognising other players and started treating us all equally. Though after that we did not win any major tournaments, but the improvement in the game was very much visible. The most visible change was that we all were now enjoying the game. I believe this intervention, which was a very basic one made an impact on our attitudes.