LIVERPOOL'S ALISSON AND MAN CITY'S RODRI AREN'T LYING – FOOTBALLERS ARE CLOSER TO A STRIKE THAN YOU THINK

Man City’s Rodri has claimed players are close to going on strike over fixture congestion - and we are closer to that point than ever before.

UEFA probably wanted the headlines to be focused solely on the football as the first games of the new-look Champions League group stage got underway. Instead, they’ve been stolen by Manchester City midfielder Rodri, who suggested players were “close” to taking strike action over fixture congestion and the increasing demands being made on players’ physical and mental health.

“I think it’s the general opinion of the players,” the Euro 2024 champion told reporters during a pre-match press conference. “And if it keeps this way, there will be a moment where we have no other option… I don’t know what’s going to happen but it’s something that worries us because we are the guys that suffer.”

The Spaniard wasn’t the only Premier League player to complain ahead of their Champions League fixtures yesterday. Liverpool goalkeeper Alisson expressed his frustrations not only with the ever-increasing workload but at the lack of communication and consultation between governing bodies and players.

“Nobody asks the players what they think about adding more games," said the 31-year-old. “Maybe our opinion doesn't matter, but everybody knows what we think about having more games. Everybody's tired of that… So many players have spoken already about it, we just need to be listened to.”

The questions came up in part because the new league-style Champions League group system puts two extra fixtures on the calendar for each competing team, while the revamped Club World Cup will add even more games to the fixture list. If a Manchester City player like Rodri, for instance, played in every possible domestic and international match, they will play 84 times by the end of the 2024/25 season. You only need to look at Chelsea’s Reece James who, in the 2020/21 season, played 47 matches for the Blues, plus international duty with England, to see a prime example of the injury nightmare that can befall an overworked player.

“From my experience between 40 [to] 50 is the amount of games in which a player can perform in the highest level,” Rodri continued. “After that you drop because it is impossible to sustain the physical level… I think we have to take care of ourselves. Someone has to take care of ourselves because we are the main characters of this sport or business or whatever you want to call it.”

A lot of people may not feel immense sympathy for extremely well-remunerated players over their workloads but not only do they believe the bloated fixture list decreases their performance quality, there also is mounting evidence that it’s causing more injuries – a BBC Sport report from November 2023, for instance, noted a 15% increase in injuries following the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, which was held in mid-season, while the PFA claims that 60% of players felt a lack of proper rest and recovery time was resulting in increased fitness problems. Concerns have also been raised about the impact of a packed schedule on players’ mental health.

But while the players may have every reason to be worried and frustrated, there’s not an extensive history of joint action being taken against football’s governing bodies. Only twice in the history of English football, for instance, has strike action been serious threatened – once in 1961 when the late Jimmy Hill led action to force The FA to abolish the £20 maximum wage, and again in 2001 over the Premier League’s attempts to reduce the percentage of broadcasting revenue which filtered down to the PFA. On both occasions, a strike was averted after negotiations, and English professional players have yet to go on strike. This time, however, could be different.

This year’s additions to the schedule seem to have finally stung players’ unions and domestic leagues into action, in part because they’re frustrated by a perceived lack of communication between UEFA and FIFA and other stakeholders. Players are unhappy because they’re working more and more. Leagues and FAs are unhappy because they’re being forced to make compromises to work around unilateral decisions made by bodies above them in the pecking order – for instance, the decision to scrap FA Cup replays and seed the EFL Cup draw was down to the matches added to European competition this season.

In July, matters reached a head. Joint legal action was started by FIFPRO Europe (the umbrella body linking the various continental equivalents of the PFA) and league bodies representing professional football in over 30 European countries. They have made a formal complaint to the European Commission against FIFA, which claims that the global governing body has “consistently refused to include national leagues and player unions in its decision-making process” which has led to “unsustainable” fixture lists which risk the health of its players.

FIFA responded by claiming there had been “comprehensive and inclusive consultation” and accusing the leagues of “acting with commercial self-interest”, citing the money-spinning global off-season tours which are now see players travelling and playing even more to make clubs extra cash – although it must be noted that pre-season friendly decision are typically made by said clubs and not by the leagues or the players, who registered the complaint.

This action comes after FIFPRO called for regulation to cap the number of games off the back of a review of workload and recovery methods which concluded that there was “an emergency” around the physical and mental health of its members. The review found that 50% of players surveyed had been made to play through injury while 82% of managers admitted to playing players that they knew needed a rest.

“We are faced with one of the most urgent problems with our sport, which has risen through a failure of government,” said FIFPRO Europe president David Terrier in May. “It has given rise to dangerous mental and physical fatigue… Players have gone beyond the limit and the international timetable is full to the brim. What is FIFA’s response? More matches, more competitions, more money – without any guarantee for the players.”

Those concerns were echoed by Premier League chief executive Richard Masters, who described the problem of fixture congestion as “real” and La Liga chief Javier Tebas, who claimed that FIFA had “ignored” their complaints. As a result, FIFA faces legal scrutiny over its decision to expand the fixture list further, a decision made primarily with the aim of increasing revenue from the Club World Cup, which had previously under-performed.

The outcome of that legal action will determine whether players really go on strike. If FIFA are forced into concessions or at least some degree of rapprochement by the European Commission, then that could be all that’s required to put an end to the notion of action by players – but if they attempt to dig in, there is a growing sentiment, one being amplified by influential organisations like FIFPRO and the PFA, that strike action is a serious possibility.

As players are forced to risk their health for our entertainment – all while providing ever-diminishing returns as football reaches saturation point. The only people who benefit from the extra matches being crowbarred into the schedule are the clubs and governing bodies who directly profit from the extra advertising opportunities and ticket sales.

Should the response from FIFA prove to be negative – and their comments so far make it clear that Gianni Infantino has no intention of taking the players’ side unless compelled to by a higher power – then we really could see players on strike across Europe for the first time in history, and the beginning of an era in which player power extends beyond the dressing room and social media and into the governance of the game itself. Rodri is right that the player are the main characters of this sport, and they are being driven into the ground.

2024-09-18T11:06:39Z dg43tfdfdgfd