Examining sports injury stories and sports anxiety levels of elite rugby players

In this study, it was aimed to examine the sports injury stories and sports injury anxiety levels of elite rugby athletes according to some selected variables. The universe of the study consists of 400 players in 16 rugby clubs registered with the Turkish Rugby Federation and actively playing sports. Sample; 39 men 36 women who are A national team athletes, 20 men 20 women who are U 18 national team athletes, are actively involved in rugby sports in clubs, actively participate in the matches, compete in the U18 category, 40 men 25 women and 26 men 24 who compete in the adults category. It consists of a total of 230 volunteer elite rugby players, including women. In the study, a personal information form prepared by the researchers and the Sports Injury Anxiety Scale developed by Rex and Metzler (2016) and adapted into Turkish by Caz, Kayhan and Bardakçı (2019) were used as data collection tools. Data was collected through survey application. Descriptive statistics, independent sample t-test and one-way ANOVA test, which are parametric tests, were used in the analysis of the research. As a result of this study, it was determined that elite rugby players mainly suffered shoulder (%16.45), knee (%14.75) and ankle (%12.79) injuries. has been made. The most common injuries diagnosed by the doctor are sprain (%19.37), strain (%17.49), crush (%12.57), skin abrasion and tear. It is seen that (%11.69). It was determined that rugby players were most often injured in the tackle vii position (%44.4), during the first half (%52.6), in the defensive position (%56.5) and while standing (%64.3). The statistical significance levels between the variables of age, gender, occupation, education level, injury status and income level of the players and the level of injury anxiety were evaluated. A significant difference was found in the sub-dimensions of disappointing and losing social support for both male and female athletes under the age of 18 and in the 18 age group (p<0.05). While gender and income status did not create a significant difference (p>0.05), it was determined that there was a significant difference in the sub-dimension of losing social support of students and athletes (p<0.05). Considering the duration of the athletes being away from training, a significant difference was found between these periods and their injury anxiety levels (p<0.05). However, it is seen that the injury anxiety levels of elite rugby players are at a high level.