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What do you call a team whose players play in a very coordinated way, and all know each other well (meaning that each player knows how the other teammate plays and plays according to the other player's playing in a manner that maximizes the team's performance) Short and to the point - they play in a very coordinated manner together.

Based on my own dictionary definitions, all the following terms should be correct, but I've found their meanings in some online dictionaries. So I doubt if they are correct now. Please help me to find the best choice which a native speaker would say:

a) coordinated team

b) coherent team

c) harmonious team

d) homogeneous team

Based on dictionary definitions, I guess there should be a fixed term. I'm looking for that; otherwise, these all can work properly, at least for me and according to the dictionary definitions.

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From thefreedictionary.com...

tight-knit - closely and firmly integrated
a tight-knit team (that's over 900 hits in Google Books)

Note that plain tight is also quite common, particularly in reference to a band (group of musicians) whose playing is highly coordinated. In many contexts, tight-knit may also have strong overtones of bound in love or friendship, but that "emotional" dimension isn't required for the usage.

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  • Wow. Great. So it is possible to call such a team a "tight-knit team". Thank you very much FumbleFingers. It was very informative. :)
    – A-friend
    Oct 5, 2016 at 16:08
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    @A-friend: I was adding just that example as you were writing your comment! So obviously the answer is Yes, indeed! Note that homogeneous means all of the same type, harmonious usually means get on well together, and coherent usually means sensible, comprehensible, so they're probably not the meanings you want anyway. And coordinated would usually be used more explicitly as well-coordinated. In fact, a well-coordinated team is actually more common than a tight-knit team in Google Books, but I think the latter sounds more idiomatic today (especially in speech).
    – FumbleFingers
    Oct 5, 2016 at 16:17
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From your description I would say that the members display precision teamwork, in that they always do exactly the thing needed to support the other team members. I might even say they display seamless coordination, in that there are no gaps left to be covered. For a more common phrasing well-coordinated would be the most common phrasing.

Going through your dictionary-based suggestions:

a) coordinated team

This doesn't feel like it's strong enough without an intensifier.

b) coherent team

If someone was talking about a coherent team I'd think more of a business, where all members play a needed role in meeting the common goals. (Often you hear stories about a business that fails because of an incoherent business strategy, where different goals are pursued that don't add up to a useful whole.)

c) harmonious team

harmonious means "smooth and peaceful". While a harmonious team may be quite capable of working together effectively, and a disharmonious team is unlikely to accomplish the same thing, a harmonious team is not necessarily an effective one.

d) homogeneous team

homogeneous means "all the same". You can say that a country's population is homogeneous when everyone speaks the same native language and there is very little or no evidence of ethnic minorities. In the context of a sports team you might have a group of generalist players, with none specialized in a skill above the others. In most sports this would not be a helpful thing. (However, a youth sports coach might appreciate having a team that was all at the same approximate level of skill rather than having to balance a group of players with wildly divergent abilities.)

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