Organisational Behaviour – I

Quiz I

The fascinating thing about football is that it broadly offers two completely different experiences to
the people who are involved with it. While some believe that watching the players on the field move
swiftly along with the ball, passing it, swinging it, co-ordinating with each other throughout, is what
brings out the joy and the beauty of the game, others believe that the intense competition and the
pride that is associated with winning the game is what makes football the most watched (and
probably the most loved) game on the planet. This concept can be generalized and applied for all
sports. So irrespective of what the sport is, there are these two perceptions associated with it. Each
game has its own set of viewers and fans, and the perception of the majority of the fans is what
determines how the sport is perceived in general.

Now one cannot deny the correlation that exists between the audience’s energy and the players’
performance and behaviour on the field. We can take cricket for example. Even though it is one
game, we see a lot of difference between Test Cricket and T20 cricket. We don’t observe as much
intensity and as much crowd involvement in Test cricket as we do in T20 cricket. This reflects in the
aggressiveness of the players as well. We don’t see as much sledging in the Test Cricket as we do in
T20 cricket. We know that people who appreciate Test cricket are those who perceive cricket as this
“gentlemen’s game” where priority is given to the beauty in the shots played and balls bowled rather
than winning or losing. On the other hand, the majority the enthusiasts of T20 cricket are more
interested in the result of the game giving more priority to the intense competition that takes place.

This brings us back to the original argument about different perceptions. Most football viewers
perceive football as a sport which is very competitive. Winning the game matters more than anything
unlike Test Cricket. This aggressive attitude leads to players and management involving themselves in
unethical practices. Playing foul game, sledging, causing physical harm to the opposition team,
sledging etc. are the results of this attitude. The reason that the introduction of Yellow and Red cards
could not regulate the violence in the field, to the extend it intended to, is that the perception of the
game still remains to be that of an extremely competitive one.