Manchester City midfielder Rodri suffered an ACL tear on Sept. 22 against Arsenal. Photo courtesy of The Guardian.
MARIA CLARA KOLLER | STAFF REPORTER | mkollerfernandez@butler.edu
Overtime, or “OT,” is an opinion column series where the Collegian takes national sports headlines or polarizing topics and gives them a Butler-centric angle.
The 2024-25 soccer calendar is filled to the brim with games and tournaments, and soccer is at its tipping point. In the past couple of seasons, FIFA and UEFA have gambled with players’ health as they introduce new tournaments and formats, packing the already full calendars with more games than the players can handle. The effects of fixture congestion — the scenario where players must play multiple games in a short time frame — have already come to light, with players’ injury rates going up on average as they only have a three-week offseason.
This season looks to be the most physically demanding and tiring one yet, with players such as Manchester City forward Erling Haaland looking at 354-day-long seasons. Time and time again FIFA and UEFA have put players at risk and profited off these suffocating calendars. These governing bodies have failed to prioritize player health and performance quality over their own financial interests and greed — leading to tensions between players, clubs and soccer’s key organizations.
Club World Cup, Champions League and the UEFA Nations League
Late last year, FIFA announced that it would be changing the format of the Club World Cup; instead of being an annual tournament between the six champions of each confederation, the tournament will now adopt the same format as the World Cup. 32 club teams from all over the world will compete every four years in a month-long tournament.
This competition has been the latest and clearest disruption in the soccer calendar. This year the tournament will start on June 15, just two weeks after the Champions League final and the end of the club season. Furthermore, FIFA recently announced that teams competing in the Club World Cup must arrive in the US three to five days before their first game. This leaves some players without rest between World Cup qualifiers and the Club World Cup.
The world’s top stars, such as Haaland and Real Madrid teammates – midfielder Jude Bellingham and forward Kylian Mbappé – could play up to 70 games this season. As Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola puts it, “70 games is like [the] NBA … but in the NBA they have four month holidays and [we have] three weeks!”
The Club World Cup is not the only instance of governing soccer bodies saturating the calendar with fixtures. UEFA recently changed the Champions League format, increasing the number of teams from 32 to 36 and the total number of games from 125 to 189. The biannual UEFA Nations League — a league-like international tournament — was also founded in 2018 and has increased the number of games.
Junior international studies major Alan Vance does not buy into the UEFA Nations League hype that the federation wants to create.
“I do not watch [the UEFA Nations League],” Vance said. “It is a tournament that interrupts the club season and creates a lot of injuries; I wish it didn’t exist.”
The Nations League is a prime example of how UEFA attempts to justify new, unnecessary tournaments. The Nations League is a completely pointless, overly complicated and hard-to-follow tournament that almost no soccer fan truly watches. Despite the competition being a clear attempt to pursue its own financial gain, UEFA has claimed that the true goal of the Nations League is to replace meaningless international friendlies with more competition.
With competitions such as the Champions League and the Nations League, the effects of bloating fixtures have been revealed in the past couple of seasons, as injury rates and sidelined players have increased.
Injuries
It is clear that players are suffocated with more games than they are physically able to handle. Some of the effects are already clear since in Oct. of 2022 — right before the 2022 World Cup — players missed 11.35 games on average due to injury. After the 2022 World Cup, in January of 2023, that number rose to 19.41.
Amandeep Basra, a senior astrophysics and physics double major, condemns the calendar’s effect on injuries and performance.
“If you overwork the players, then there will [be] less good games in the future as everyone will be cautious and save their energy for other fixtures,” Basra said. “We have seen a spike in ACL injuries this season which has caused many big names to be sidelined for the rest of the season.”
As games increase, the performance and quality go down. More players get burnt out and consequently injured as they struggle to keep up with the compressed schedule. Al-Hilal forward Neymar, Manchester City midfielder Rodri, Real Madrid defender Dani Carvajal, Real Madrid defender Eder Militão and Real Madrid defender David Alaba are just some of the players who have been plagued by ACL injuries these past seasons — with Militao experiencing his second ACL injury in two seasons on Nov. 9 against Osasuna.
Most of these players played upwards of 50 games before their eventual injuries. With that said, a season of 70 to 75 games could have unprecedented consequences. FC Barcelona midfielder Pedri has been one of the clearest cases of what happens when a player is burnt out. Notoriously, in the 2020-21 season, Pedri played 80 games and has since missed 75 games due to injury.
The consequences of overloading players with games and tournaments are clear. However, this season could have effects never seen before, as this will be the longest season in history.
Potential solutions
One solution players such as Rodri have discussed is going on strike. However, as powerful as that solution might be, it is not necessarily feasible.
There are organizations that represent soccer players worldwide; one example is Fédération Internationale des Associations de Footballeurs Professionnels, or FIFPRO, which represents around 65,000 players. A strike would have to be organized by these governing bodies and would most likely take all of the players these organizations represent. Players at the top level make exorbitant amounts of money, some earning upwards of $250,000 a week while players in second or even third divisions make one-tenth of that.
Simply put, players in these lower divisions might not be as keen to support players who are multi-millionaires, as they make significantly less money and cannot afford to take time off from what is ultimately their job.
Senior finance major and lifelong Monterrey fan Juan Septien thinks it would be difficult for the players to go on strike.
“I do not know if they can, [since] clubs and FIFA can justify [the calendar] with the large salaries of the players,” Septien said. “[They] bring in more money. It’s what any business wants.”
At the end of the day, a player-run strike is far from feasible. However, the people who truly have the power to change the current state of the game are club owners and managers. A viable solution could be to have the top teams that compete in the Club World Cup send a squad similar to the ones national teams send to the Olympics.
In the Olympics, national teams normally send their Under-23 squad except for two players who are allowed to be over the age limit. If managers and club owners sent their “reserves” to the Club World Cup, it would take power away from FIFA as it would diminish the prestige of the tournament.
At the end of the day, what makes major tournaments prestigious are not just the teams that compete in them but also the players that win them. For example, soccer has been a sport in the Olympics longer than the World Cup has been around and both have had the same teams play in both tournaments. However, the World Cup is a far more prestigious event due to the players — such as Lionel Messi, Diego Maradona and Pelé — who have played and won it.
Basra explained why FIFA and UEFA overwork the players.
“The basic reason would be to generate more revenue,” Basra said. “The players must communicate with FIFA and UEFA to get to an agreement.”
Some of the action that has already been taken against FIFA has been a legal complaint filed by FIFPRO, in which the governing body claimed, “FIFA’s decisions over the last years have repeatedly favored its own competitions and commercial interests, neglected its responsibilities as a governing body and harmed the economic interests of national leagues and the welfare of players.”
What this issue has made clear is that soccer is a dictatorship, as the players are ruled by FIFA and have no say in issues that directly impact them. FIFA and UEFA have made it clear that they will not prioritize players over their own financial agendas which means it is up to club owners and managers to take a stand for the sake of their players and the game.
