Relationship between Coaches and Soccer Players from Different Professional Levels

Abstract

The purpose of this this study was to examine the athlete-coach relationship between soccer players with respect to their professional level and age of starting soccer. 284 amateur football players and 154 professional football players, aged 15 and over, participated to the study. Athlete–Coach relationship scale was used as a data collection tool. The analysis of the obtained data was analyzed by two-way multivariate variance analysis (2-way MANOVA). As a result of the analysis, the level of communication between the coach and the athlete the age of starting soccer and the status of becoming amateur, professional soccer player had emerged significant difference. Amateur footballers have a better communication level with their coaches than professional footballers, and when the age of starting sport is considered the relations of football players who started sports after 11 years of age and becoming professional footballers are at the highest level of communication with coaches according to this result.