A Study on Sports Anxiety between State Level and National Level Football Referees in India

Abstract

Background: In the world of football, the success or failure of a match is not only the responsibility of the players, manager, or coach but is more dominantly determined by the leadership of the referee. Objective: The purpose of the present study is to find out the anxiety level between state and national level football referees. Method: Total hundred football referees (fifty state level and fifty national levels) were selected from Calcutta Football League (CFL) in West Bengal, B.C. Roy Trophy at Una in Himachal Pradesh, Santosh Trophy at Nayveli in Tamil Nadu, B.C. Roy Trophy at Bhubaneswar in Odisha, West Zone National Football Tournament at Jodhpur in Rajasthan, U-16 I-League Tournament and U-19 I-League Tournament for the study. Sports anxiety was considered as variables and it was measured by sports competitive anxiety test (SCAT) questionnaire. Data was collected with proper instruction from the referees just prior to the sixty minutes of the competition. The age of football referees ranged between 22 to 30 years. Result: The obtained results show that significant difference is found in sports anxiety (p=0.04) between state level and national level football referees. It is also found that the anxiety of state level referees (19.28±3.04) was higher than the national level referees (15.72±2.52). Conclusion: The study concluded that state level referees have a higher level of anxiety in comparison to national level referees. The fact behind that may be as national-level referees are more experienced and they have greater opportunity to conduct more matches than state level referees and assessors’ assessment of each national level matches help them to grow more confidence and managing capacity of stress and anxiety at pre, during and post-match circumstances.