Pivoting a table in SQL Server 2005 to contain same column multiple times

Question

I need to pivot the following table named tblGameRoleName -

Game        Role    Name
VolleyBall  Coach   Sujatha
VolleyBall  Player  Rajendran
VolleyBall  Player  Juno
VolleyBall  Player  Indira
VolleyBall  Player  Ganesh
VolleyBall  Player  Vasanth
Tennis      Coach   Rajeshkumar
Tennis      Player  Vivek
Tennis      Player  Rubala

to the following table which has the 'Player' column multiple times -

Game        Coach       Player1     Player2 Player3 Player4 Player5
VolleyBall  Sujatha     Rajendran   Juno    Indira  Ganesh  Vasanth
Tennis      Rajeshkumar Vivek       Rubala  NULL    NULL    NULL

The problem is that the number of 'players' can increase for different 'games' and the result table should show all the players for all the games. For example - If I add the following 'cricket' team to this table -

Cricket Coach   Gary
Cricket Player  Viru
Cricket Player  Gauti
Cricket Player  Sachin
Cricket Player  Mahi
Cricket Player  Yuvi
Cricket Player  Suresh
Cricket Player  Virat
Cricket Player  Bhajji
Cricket Player  Zaheer
Cricket Player  Ishant
Cricket Player  Ashish

Then the result table should show 11 player columns.

Can this be achieved with the help of the PIVOT function? If not, please suggest the correct way to achieve the result table.

Answer 1

This may be easier in a front end reporting/display application but for sql you need to perform a dynamic pivot. But since the columns are aliased by a sequential player number and the specific players vary by game you can't use the typcial dynamic sql examples.

Here is one way to do it:

sample data

set ansi_warnings off
set nocount on
create table #t (Game varchar(20), Role varchar(15), [Name] varchar(20))
insert #t
          select 'VolleyBall', 'Coach', 'Sujatha'
union all select 'VolleyBall', 'Player', 'Rajendran'
union all select 'VolleyBall', 'Player', 'Juno'
union all select 'VolleyBall', 'Player', 'Indira'
union all select 'VolleyBall', 'Player', 'Ganesh'
union all select 'VolleyBall', 'Player', 'Vasanth'
union all select 'Tennis', 'Coach', 'Rajeshkumar'
union all select 'Tennis', 'Player', 'Vivek'
union all select 'Tennis', 'Player', 'Rubala'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Coach', 'Gary'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Player', 'Viru'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Player', 'Gauti'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Player', 'Sachin'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Player', 'Mahi'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Player', 'Yuvi'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Player', 'Suresh'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Player', 'Virat'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Player', 'Bhajji'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Player', 'Zaheer'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Player', 'Ishant'
union all select 'Cricket', 'Player', 'Ashish'

create dynamic SELECT and PIVOT clauses and the EXEC'd statement

declare @max int
select top 1 @max = count(*)
from #t 
where role = 'player' 
group by game 
order by count(*) desc

declare @sel varchar(2000)
       ,@piv varchar(2000)

;with nos (n) as (select 1 union all select n+1 from nos where n < @max)
select @sel = coalesce(@sel + ', ' 
       + 'max([' + convert(varchar(2), n) + ']) as player' + convert(varchar(2), n)
       , 'max([' + convert(varchar(2), n) + ']) as player' + convert(varchar(2), n)
       )

       ,@piv = coalesce(@piv + ',[' + convert(varchar(2), n) + ']', '[' + convert(varchar(2), n) + ']')
from   nos
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

exec('
select p.game
       ,max(p.coach) as coach
       ,' + @sel + '
from   (
       select game
              ,case when role = ''coach'' then [name] end as coach
              ,case when role = ''player'' then [name] end as player
              ,row_number() over (partition by game, role order by name) as seq
       from   #t
       ) d
pivot (max(player) for seq in (' + @piv + ')) p
group by p.game
')

go
drop table #t

OUTPUT:

game                 coach                player1              player2              player3              player4              player5              player6              player7              player8              player9              player10             player11
-------------------- -------------------- -------------------- -------------------- -------------------- -------------------- -------------------- -------------------- -------------------- -------------------- -------------------- -------------------- --------------------
Cricket              Gary                 Ashish               Bhajji               Gauti                Ishant               Mahi                 Sachin               Suresh               Virat                Viru                 Yuvi                 Zaheer
Tennis               Rajeshkumar          Rubala               Vivek                NULL                 NULL                 NULL                 NULL                 NULL                 NULL                 NULL                 NULL                 NULL
VolleyBall           Sujatha              Ganesh               Indira               Juno                 Rajendran            Vasanth              NULL                 NULL                 NULL                 NULL                 NULL                 NULL