ABSTRACT
There’s nothing better than returning to one of your old haunts, somewhere that conjures up fond memories and provides a sense of comfort when you’re there. Maybe it’s a familiar restaurant or a pub you used to frequent. How disappointing, then, when you come back one day and find that it’s changed. Maybe new management has come in to update the menu or the décor, and it just doesn’t feel the way it used to. Such is the challenge for athletes returning to their teams following injury. Often, they’ve been excluded from training while rehabilitating, and they may have missed significant amounts of competition, travel, or other team events. They will have been replaced in the starting squad and probably have had limited interaction with their coaches during their absence. So, when they come back, they may find that the environment has changed, and they might not fit within it in the way they used to. This chapter discusses the influence of team social dynamics and coach behavior on the ability of athletes to return successfully from injury. It focuses on managing discrepancies between the athlete’s perceptions of their pre- and post-injury roles and how these can be minimized in practice.
