Levels and Differences of Leadership Practices by Eminent Coaches Amongst the Team Athlete’s at Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (UPSI)

This research is conducted to identify the level and differences of leadership practices between the popular coachesamong team athletes at Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (UPSI). A total of 50 respondents comprising 30 male athletes and 20 female athletes were selected from the team athletes at Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (UPSI). The research instrument used is Leadership Scale for Sports (LSS) Questionnaire which was developed by Chelladurai and Saleh (1978; 1980) and has been translated into Malay language. This questionnaire has 5 dimensions of coaching style, ie a) Training and Instruction Dimension, b) Democratic Dimension, c) Autocratic Dimension, d) Social Support Dimension, e) Positive Feedback Dimension. An independent t-test inferential statistical analysis is used to analyze data. The findings show that there is no significant difference between male team athlete and female team athletes in all the favourite dimensions of coaching style amongst the athlete’s team. The findings also showed that the dimension of leadership style using Training and Instruction is the most favourable among the athlete team at Universiti Pendidikan Sultan Idris (UPSI).