Sakaryaspor Fans' Levels of Identification with their Team and Perceptions of the Team Image

The level of identification of the fans with their team and their perceptions of the team image are essential in order to understand the position of the team in the eyes of the fans. In this direction, this study was conducted to determine the level of identification of Sakaryaspor fans with their team and to reveal their perceptions of team image. The study was designed as a quantitative cross sectional study. The study sample consisted of 300 Sakaryaspor Fans. The Sports Fan Identification Scale developed by Wann and Branscombe (1993) and adapted to Turkish by Günay and Tiryaki (2003), and the Club Image Scale developed by Jung (2012) and adapted into Turkish by Sönmezoğlu, Çoknaz and Polat (2016) were used as data collection tools in the research. Besides, 10 item quastionnaire prepared by the researchers were added to the data collection tool to identify the demographic information of the participants. The data were collected via Google Forms due to the pandemic. SPSS 25.0 was used in the analysis of the data. Independent Samples T Test and Anova were used in the analysis as the data showed normal distribution. Post hoc tests were used to determine the source of the difference. Besides, Pearson Correlation test was used to investigate the relationship between the level of identification with the team and the perception towards team image. As a result of the research, it was seen that Sakaryaspor fans' level of identification with the team and their perceptions of the team image were at a moderate level. Moderate level positive (r=.532) and significant relationship (p<.05) was found between Sakaryaspor fans' perceptions of the team image and their level of identification with the team. It was observed that the level of identification with the team and the perception of the team image of the fans who went to home matches and who went to away matches and who were the members of their team's fan group or who had a high number of watching seasonal matches were higher than the other participants.