Cricket World Cup Editorial: Winning Ingredients

When a team lets its fans down, it is natural for the fans to want to identify the source of their disappointment. This usually comes in the form of pointing out a coach, a player, funding or some other factor that may have led to the poor performance of the team. However sometimes losing is a part of the process of learning how to win.

Winning in sport or any profession is the result of success at many stages of a process; and hence, winning should be seen as a process, rather than a result. Winners usually emerge after the successful application of a number of factors that release potential in individual, as well as team players.

Losing on the other hand, is usually the result faltering in one or more of the stages of winning.

Talent is a significant first step that provides competitive edge in sport or any discipline. However, it is not a determining factor in itself and can sometimes prove to be a secondary consideration when measured up against willpower and the other elements of success.

Willpower is a critically important ingredient, as talent alone will not provide the competitive edge that is needed to be a successful player. Willpower is the foundation of competitive drive, and when it is strong, willpower can even overpower some fundamental physical limitations; such as sports player who finishes a game without feeling the pain of an injury until the game is over.

For a team, the competitive edge in high performance almost always rests on the cohesiveness of the group. In a high performance team environment, the players perceive themselves as part of a collective whole. In this vein, personal responsibility and accountability is a very important characteristic.

To best understand the value of cohesiveness, picture some of the winners in Cricket World Cup, and remember the times when the teams played ‘on top of their game’ as if they were telepathically connected. At times like this it seems like each player knew what the other was going to do next, before it was done. This is cohesion, and this is the ‘win-zone’ in team sports.

Another ingredient of winning is self belief, which is equally important on an individual and team basis. Without self belief, wins are rare. This is because the thoughts and images in the mind often determine the outcomes of an effort.
For example, if a person stands at the edge of the stream and imagines that the stream is too wide and their legs too weak, they are very likely to end up with wet feet.

However, if that same person stands on the edge of a stream believing that the stream presents an enjoyable challenge, and that their legs are strong enough to leap to the other side; they are more likely to have dry shoes at the end of their effort.


In the event that wet feet are the result anyway, positive self belief will be the driving factor in sport that keeps people working towards their goals until they get it right.

Ms. Ellard-Deveney has worked as an equestrian coach in Canada for ten years.