it will reach to a certain point where clubs will purposely throw in the small cup and it turns into which team wanted to lose more.
As a football fan, I’m really confused why I’m hearing so much talk about how the schedule is more congested than ever and players are at a breaking point. Since I started watching football 15 years ago, the schedule has been the same as it’s always been for the players in the Top 5 leagues, same cups, same UCL format with 4 international breaks every season and I major tournament every 2 years. Yet the for the last couple of years I’ve been hearing many coaches, players and fans going on about how their age too many games nowadays when the schedule is the same as it was 15 years ago. Also the new UCL and CWC format come into effect yet so I’m even more confused. And it’s usually big 6 coaches, fans and players that complain about the schedule like someone like they have the chance to rest their players and use the bench or academy players in cup games. Arteta doesn’t have to play Saka in the FA CUP and league cup if he genuinely cares about his fitness levels. Can somebody explain what I’m missing because I am very confused?
Two main reasons: COVID, which also pushed back Euro 2020, made the 19/20, 20/21 and 21/22 seasons very intense. 22/23 had the winter world cup too which made the season very congested. (until we were knocked out of the EL by Sevilla United played every midweek until May)
So this current season is the first “normal” season in a few years, but the damage has already been done as you can see with all the injuries. On top of that, the calendar will only get more congested 2-4 extra CL group games and the expanded Club World Cup. That’s why players and managers are speaking up.
The other thing is, all the teams are playing with much more intensity now, so players have to work harder in the matches themselves. There are almost no easy games in the Prem anymore for this reason.
They got rid of international friendlies in Europe and replaced them with the Nations League so there is definitely more competitive football for international players.
Also they increased the number of teams that qualify for international tournaments so that’s more players playing more games. And in South America they seem to be having international tournaments more regularly than they used to.
Difficult to disagree looking at the injuries. United have 7-8 injured currently and many of them key players.
100%. Doesn’t help that there is an international break every three weeks. It’s mental. Give them time to recover
“I love playing 12.30” Jürgen Klopp
He’s not wrong. This is anecdotal, but the amount of non-contact muscle and ligament injuries I’ve seen in the past year to players that don’t get a break on international duty seems genuinely unprecedented.
Nation’s League needs to go. There’s no need to have competitive international matches outside of WC/Continental Cups and qualifying.
No one actually gives a shit about Nation’s League, but the international managers have to play their best squad available to pad their record and keep their job. Fewer competitive international matches would be better for everyone involved. Let some youngsters get a cap in a meaningless friendly and acjieve their dream of representing their country, and give the world class internationals a damn rest!
Capitalist Stakeholders: Okay.
Ty next
plays bruno once again
oh so now he’s an advocate for player welfare…
Manager who doesn’t rotate his first XI when he has the option to is surprised when players get injured.
Other than reducing teams in the top flight from 20 to 18 (like in Germany and France) what else can be done? You can’t reduce the amount of CL games, cups are single leg only until later stages.
Clearly adding more games is incredibly stupid, but I don’t see how you can reduce them.
World cup in the middle of the year was horrific. Then they are even increasing the CL size now. Players are gonna get worn out pretty bad
I am all for 18 teams.
Btw, in Germany all cup games are single-leg. And there is only one national cup, like God intended. So there is still further room to reduce games in England, apart from the size of the league.
Just kick Chelsea and City out and it’s sorted.
Amen
Increase squad size and limit how many games a player can play in a year.
Of course the “obvious” solution is to reduce games played but that will put a dent in the organizer’s pocket so it’s never happening.
Imagine City with an even bigger squad
Did you see its bench yesterday? It has one of the smallest squads in the league.
Didnt need to just play the squad player. Wtf ten hag
Increasing squad size and limiting games per player is massively favouring financially wealthy clubs and clubs that are struggling will get absolutely shafted by this.
That would be even worse than continuing with the current way.
What do you think of mandating a minimum number of minutes for academy players/season, to take pressure off big players. Something like 2000-3000 minutes (i.e 20-30 games worth, to be split between as many academy players as need be). Also incentivizes clubs bring youth through
Interesting idea but how would you account for academies that don’t have players at a decent level enough for top tier football, prevent burnout of that one top prospect etc?
Also for clubs that get promoted, they are already facing an uphill battle to avoid relegation.
If they are forced to play youth too, that will make things all the more harder since the bigger clubs will just sign the promising players.
The number of games issue is primarily for clubs in the CL, EL, ECL.
Could just mandate it for teams playing in 4 competitions, or require them to play 2000 minutes and everyone else to play 1000
impossible, it will just ruin the market and quality of the league.
Big leagues increasing squad size will make the smaller leagues a lot shitter :(
reduce games played but that will put a dent in the organizer’s pocket so it’s never happening.
People always ignore that the players won’t accept dropping their wages either. It’s just
I know r/soccer hates Newcastle but what’s happening to them at the moment is a poster for what’s wrong here (so are Brighton, and others, and indeed most clubs have big injury lists).
Club gets to the champions league spot for the 1st time in ages, spends basically the max allowed by FFP to try to increase the squad to cope but it’s nowhere near enough. Yesterday 10+ out after getting several back post international break. Their 25 man squad left the line up as including a 17 year old in the first 11, 3 goalkeepers on the bench, 4 kids with basically 0 prem mins and 2 semi-retired lads whose ages probably sum to 112.
If we’re not to change to less games, do away with injury time (by punishing harshly any time wasting perhaps?). Or could some forced rotation work - eg in baseball they often play 5 days in a row but have different pitchers each day. Could limit the number of starters who are allowed to play a mid-week game after playing 70+mins at the weekend.
Prem should make squad caps larger at the least if the schedule must be like this
My only worry with increasing the squad size is that it would make the league even more uneven, as the big clubs hoover up more talent.
The injuries are mad this season.
It’s not just the amount of matches but also the stop start nature of VAR and playing 50-55 minute halves mean it’s becoming a joke.
Every team seems to be having an injury crisis. Limping across the line to the next international break.