Where has that passion for sports gone?

It is an undeniable fact that there is no real passion for sports anymore in St Vincent and the Grenadines.

Instead, there is a pronounced lame approach generally, both by administrators and players alike.

This type of lethargy and going through the motions are among the causes which are affecting negatively performances from our sportsmen and women.

Besides, there is some visible and concrete evidence which points to the causes of this situation of disquiet.

Players suffer a severe allergic reaction to training, by physically and mentally preparing themselves for competition.

In short, many of our sportsmen and women just love the sport, but are unwilling to buckle themselves down and do the back-breaking work to make them better performers.

Also, we rarely see players of any sporting disciplines shedding tears after they or their team have lost a match or a title.

No longer is pre-competition training and ongoing practice sessions given pride of place among our sportsmen and women.

And, even when they do, that too has its prickles of variances to commitment and passion.

The common practice is for players to pay more attention to their smartphone, to catch up with the chats and other happenings during the period of their engagement in their sport.

Likewise, it is a normal occurrence that at the start of a practice session, a sweat or a competition game of football, players would be audible in arguing about Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo or Neymar, or about Real Madrid, Barcelona or Juventus.

At a Premier Division cricket match last weekend, one of the top teams in the competition could not field a full complement of players throughout the duration.

In fact, players left for home with their team in dire straits, such that there were insufficient players to field at their opponents’ second innings.

Similarly, it has become commonplace in the national netball tournament that winning/losing by default echoes regularly on the local sports reports.

This type of disinterest has left spectators to do likewise, as hardly any local sporting event can be assured of bumper crowds.

And, even if they do, it is the social sideshows, such as the music and other forms of entertainment that had enticed them to the venue.

No one, therefore, can specifically point to the root cause(s) of the steady decline in fervour for sports across the board.

However, one causative agent is the preponderance of modern technology and the impact of mass media on people’s lives.

Why should one leave his/her home and go look at a local sporting event, when you have choices via the television or any of the popular devices?

To the active participants, the sportsmen and sportsmen, they too are not even extrinsically motivated by the prize monies, the accolades, the media publicity and the opportunities to travel as part of a national representative team are pricking their zeal.

There is also the proposition that the virtual disappearance of community groups and community-based sports organizations is a possible reason for the downturn in the commitment and passion for local Vincy sports.

But the impact of the present day style of living, where persons seem not able to stick to anything for any reasonable period of time, has hit sports too.

This trend of lack of commitment, passion, love and adding real value to sports have gnawed away at the core to almost every sporting discipline over time, and are becoming more and more impactful and evident.

Recreating such love and passion for sports here in SVG, though, has to be a sociological effort, undertaken by all sectors of Vincentian life.