CRISIS MANAGEMENT IN SPORTS AND SPORTS DEVELOPMENT

Sports has become a good source of livelihood and entertainment. From time-to-time sports organizations witness violent and non-violent situations which define crisis. Violence can be internally or externally and poses a serious obstacle to effective sports management around the globe. The impact of violence in sports is really capable of inducing severe consequences or even disaster if inappropriate strategic moves are made or adopted, planned or devised. Many persons lost their source of livelihood as a result of crisis in sports.. The issue of how sports organizations can develop and maintain good performance of participants when faced with crisis situations has largely remained underexplored. This paper, therefore, reviews the concept of crisis, sports crisis, crisis management and sports development. The paper specifically discussed causes and effects of crisis on the operation of sports organizations, types of crisis management strategies and models. The paper further examined sports development in Nigeria and how it relates to crisis management in sports, since crisis management form the bedrock of peaceful co-existence between employers and employees in sports organizations and even the society at large, the paper recommends that management of sports organizations should be pro-active in their crisis management plans in order to identify, resolve and adequately handle issues  that are capable of destroying sports programmes among sports teams or clubs in the country.