It has been a crazy and somewhat successful few weeks for British sport. And amongst all the fuss, TV reporting and ticker-tape, when you look closely enough, there have been some big take-aways for those involved in business coaching or mentoring.

I live near Jerusalem, Israel, which is thousands of miles away from the action. And yet, I have seen clear deliverables that I can pass on to my commercial clients as their coach.

For example, you can barely find a snooker club in Israel. On Monday night, in the wonderful Yorkshire city of Sheffield, Mark Selby beat Ding Hanjui in the final of the world snooker championship. For Selby, heralding from nearby Leicester, this was his second such triumph. Years ago, his parents did not have enough money to help him learn the craft.

Ding was born in China. He has been living in Sheffield since he was a teenager. Sheffield has been hosting the finals for years and will continue to do so for another decade at least. In other words, the Ding family had internalized from an early stage where their ‘target audience’ is located. They then deliberately targeted the region in order to be near the money. LESSON NUMBER ONE.

A few hours previous to his triumph, Selby’s home football club, Leicester City, secured the English Premiership title. Never an easy achievement, these players were 5000 – 1 rank outsiders at the beginning of the season. What was their secret to success?

There have been many analyses. Several have pointed to the qualities of their manager, Claudio Ranieri, which just seemed to fit the moment. I looked at their squad. On paper, they are shambolic load of misfits, which you may find in lower leagues – a kind of Dad’s army outfit. They had no obvious-looking international stars.

However, they played and fought together as a team, which is what any business owner or manager needs to understand. You cannot do it all by yourself. LESSON NUMBER TWO.

And then there is the English cricket team. For all their glorious history, in the one day format of the game, the squad was considered a joke on the international circuit. However, with a new coach and a slight tinkering of the team members over six months, England oh-so-very nearly became world champions in April in India.

One of the key changes the coach had introduced was to allow players to express their natural talents more freely. In other words, they had been selected not only because of their skill-set. They had a natural belief in themselves, which had been too stifled in the past. It was time to release that strength.

Creativity is important on a playing field and as well as in a commercial environment. LESSON NUMBER THREE.

The beauty of all this for me? I have given myself the perfect excuse not to do any more business mentoring, but to go and watch some more sport. Will some people call that an excuse to procrastinate?