Help a teammate deal with their first loss

Your team just lost a big game (and may be you were favorites to win). You’ve been knocked out of the tournament. Some of the new players on your team are in tears. They’ve lost on a big stage for the first time. The tears are understandable – Being suddenly overwhelmed by frustration, anger, and this fear of being perceived as ‘not good enough’.

Here’s how to be a good (senior) teammate and talk them through:

• Wait. Don’t start talking yet. Not now. Let them have some space. An arm around the shoulder? May be.
• When he’s calmed down, walk him through what happened – He’s feeling frustration at losing, and it’s normal to feel that way, but there are better ways to deal with frustration.
• You could try telling him that teams which are considered strong today lost a lot as well, especially when they had young players, who were yet to mature in their Ultimate careers. And that it is a necessary process (losing) in a team’s evolution.
• Losing is actually part of the fun of any sport – Playing a sport competitively is about getting better and the secret to getting better lies in how we react when we lose. If we think about why we lost, and figure out what we should do differently next time, then losing will make us better.
• Let him (the rookie) watch good teams play and when they lose, ask him what he thinks they did wrong, talk about what they could have done differently, so that he can emulate them when he plays.

• When players lose their 1v1 match ups, play up the learning experience side of it; “that was close! I think you can get it next time, how do you think you could beat that guy?”

It’s about teaching him to manage his emotions and change his reactions so he can use the loss to his advantage.