RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN TEAM COHESION AND TEAM PERFORMANCE IN THE CASE OF WOLDIYA KENEMA AND DESSIE KENEMA SUPERLEAGUE FOOTBALL TEAMS

The purpose of this thesis was to investigate the relationship between team cohesion and team<br> performance in the case of Woldia Kenema and Dessie Kenema football clubs that were playing<br> in the super League of Ethiopia in 2018/19 G.C. The study compared the differences between the<br> two teams in social and task cohesion. Teams’ cohesiveness (social and task cohesion), team’s<br> performance, the extent of team cohesion in predicting team performance were also addressed.<br> The study used/adopted correlation research design. The target population comprised 50<br> players, four coaches, two team physicians, and two team leaders of Woldia Kenema and Dessie<br> Kenema football teams. A comprehensive sampling technique was used because all players,<br> coaches, physicians, and team leaders of both teams were included in the study as samples units.<br> The players completed the Group Environment Questionnaire and a measure of team<br> performance questionnaire developed by the researcher. Face to face structured interview was<br> also conducted to generate qualitative data on team cohesion and team performance. The<br> collected data were analyzed using narrative description, descriptive statistics, correlation and<br> regression. The result showed that there was significant and moderate positive correlation<br> between team cohesion and team performance. Team cohesion predicted team performance<br> explaining 42.5% of its variance. Task cohesion predicted 44.9% of its variance while social<br> cohesion didn’t. There were also significant differences between the two teams in team cohesion<br> and team performance. The result implied that team cohesion had theoretical and practical<br> significance in improving team performance. Despite limited sample size and study variables, the<br> present study figured out that team cohesion had significant positive relation with team<br> performance