Empirical Effect Of Sacking A Coach In Football Team Essay Example for Free

Empirical Effect Of Sacking A Coach In Football Team Essay Changing or sacking the coaches is the most commonly seen incidents in the game of football. Football is the most widely watched and popular game in this world. It is game of passion for not only players, coaches, or managers but also for audience, who come to watch this game. Numerous teams, clubs of football exist in this world and every team have their own followers, who wish that their team must fare well in each match. If the team fails to perform, the person who is held responsible for the poor performance is the coach of that particular team (Balduck and Buelens, 2007). The coach is either asked to resign or is sacked. Thus, this study tries to investigate whether firing the coaches renders any positive impact on the performance of the team or not. For that purpose, we are analysing few great teams of world and scrutinise their performance using empirical research model. We analysed the effect of sacking coaches by scrutinizing of few great teams in the world and their performance from 1970-2007 (Balduck and Buelens, 2007). Description Researchers have always tried to find out whether the sacking the coaches render any influence on the performance of the team or not. The first way to address this issue would be to concentrate on the rapport between team performance and sacking of the coach. Studies made by Grusky in 1963 and Brown in 1982 were based on management research whereas the case studies put forward by Theberge, Loy in 1976 and Bennet et al in the year 1986 were based on perspective of sports management (Balduck and Buelens, 2007). However, majority of researchers concluded that most teams sacked the coaches when the teams performed badly (Cannella and Rowe, 1995). It is also argued that there are three theories, which dominate the sport fraternity (Kesner 1994). The first theory says that for a while when a coached is sacked it renders positive influence on team and over all effectiveness of a particular club. Studies reveal that performance of the team improves after sacking of the coach. However, as per the second theory known as the vicious theory, the resignation or sacking of the coach affects the team’s performance in negative way for short duration. The reason being stated is it upsets the internal relationship in the club. Such disturbance within the clubs further degrades the team’s performance. The third theory is the scapegoat theory, whenever team plays badly or loses in succession; the authorities sack the coach even, if players fail to deliver themselves. Sacking the coach, trainers or manager is the most easy to way to pacify the higher authorities of the club, fans, audiences and other stakeholders (Balduck and Buelens, 2007). If we look at the performance of Manchester United from the year 1970 to 2007, we see that initially the club authorities sacked the coaches after faring poorly in matches. In the year, 1970, Wilf McGuiness was nominated as the coach of team. The team struggled to deliver under his coaching and finished eighth in football charts that year. Ultimately, Wilf was demoted and was replaced by Matt Busby in the year 1970. New coach bought some relief to the team but the coach resigned after serving the team for six months. Later, in Frank O’Farrell took the reign in his hands and bought some great talent in his team. Team fared well in domestic circuits but even Frank left the team after 18 months. Thus, it can be seen that constant sacking as well as resignation of the coaches were the reason why the team could not won any major title from the duration 1970 to 1972. Tommy Doherty was named as the new coach of Manchester United in 1972. Although, team could not deliver its best performance, Tommy was never asked to put down his papers. It was the long-term association at the club that Man Utd reached the final of FA cup in the year 1976 but could not win the title. In subsequent year, the team won FA cup. However, Tommy was sacked as coach due to some other reasons. This findings show that teams deliver their good performance when the association of the coach with the team is for long duration. In 1977, Dave Sexton took over as the coach of Manchester United, under his guidance the team shared Community shield with Liverpool. The team also made it to the final of the FA cup but could not win the cup. The association of the Dave lasted with Manchester United until 1981 and club won seven games under his coaching until he was sacked in the 1981 for not making the team capable of winning the big matches. Ron Atkinson was appointed the next coach of Manchester United, and the results were quite evident in the next three years. The club won FA cup in next consecutive years under his coaching. However, due to dipping performance in the later half of 1986, Atkinson was sacked. The authorities of the club then selected Sir Alex Ferguson as the coach of Man Utd. Alex was considered as the man who transformed the club and helped team to win huge matches. Alex is still reigning manager of the club (Manchester United – Coaches, 2003). The club won several titles under his coaching such as FA cup in 1990, 1994, and 1996. However, the club lost five matches continuously in the year 1997-98. Nevertheless, 1998-99 was the most memorable year in the history of Manchester united as it won all major cups, Premier league, FA, intercontinental and UFEA cup. The same year Alex was conferred knighthood for his contribution to the English club (Manchester United F. C. -wikipedia, 2009). In 2000-2001, Man Utd won the leagues but experienced major failures such as it made it to the final of EU cup but failed to win the match. So, one point to be noted in this regard is that the even though, Man Utd won matches and lost some in succession the authorities did not attempt to sack the coach. In 2001-2002, the club achieved third place in premiership league whereas in 2002-03, the club fared well in leagues but its performance dipped following the suspension of Rio Ferdinand. In 2004, the team again won FA cup. Year 2005 was again the year of failures for Man Utd. Most of its players failed to score gaols and there was huge uproar about sacking the coach. However, Alex remained the coach of the team. Year 2006 too started poorly as team even failed to qualify for the knockout phase of UEFA (Manchester United F. C. -wikipedia, 2009). Most of the players were gripped with injuries but team bucked up, managed to win leagues, and qualified for Champions leagues by defeating Charlton athletes by 4-0.