IS WINNING AT ALL COST RUINING SPORT?

Ever since the controversial hand ball that gave Ruseas’ High their ninth hold on the DaCosta Cup a few weeks ago there has been a debate raging about morality in sports.
Over the years we have seen an evolution in sports and the way they are played. There was a time when high school coaches told their charges that it wasn’t whether you won or lost but how you played the game. The emphasis back then was on fair play and on being gracious in both victory and defeat.
These days things are not quite that simple. Egotistical ‘old-boy’ associations trying to live vicariously through the current generation often make high demands on their high school coaches in exchange for much-needed financial help.
Not that all associations are like this, but many are.
There are other reasons, of course, why the age-old principle of fair play has given way to a paradigm that demands winning no matter what it takes but we don’t have all year.
The bottom line is that things have changed and not necessarily for the better.
But how do you rein in this desire to win at all cost? Does it start with the coaches, the parents or the principals?
My guess is that it should start at home. Parents need to understand that what your child learns now stays with him for lifetime. If he grows up thinking that winning at all cost is the way to go about life, it could lead to embarrassment later on in life. As such parents – if they can find the will to do so – must see to it that their children come to understand fair play.

Coaches too need to see that winning at all cost does have its consequences. Though it doesn’t hold true in all circumstances what a child learns on the field of play he will take with him into life.
Using your hand to score a goal is not something that should be rewarded, but shortly after the Ruseas controversial goal, there was also another incident involving Jamaica College’s Under-14 team. Was it a coincidence or did the child learn from the Ruseas situation just days before that it was perfectly acceptable to cheat in order to win.
Believe what you will but in certain things there are no coincidences.
That is where principals come in. Coaches sometimes can find themselves under so much pressure to win they may be willing to turn a blind eye to many ‘indiscretions’. So principals need to be the ones with the backbone, especially in instances where coaches are missing theirs.
Players who cheat need to be benched or at the very least made to understand that such behaviour is unacceptable.
The process of change has to start at home and in school otherwise what we will be left with is competition where anything goes. That was never the purpose of sport.