Do footballers really play too much football these days?

[Guest nufc_geordie]

This is a topic that really annoys me with the game. Until the inclusion of foreigners in our game on a mass scale this was a subject that was not broached by anyone. Now that the foreigners have started it appears it is creeping into our british players, almost like they've been brainwashed that they must play fewer games, that we need a winter break. Well as far as I'm concerned for the money they get paid and the length of their careers they could damn well be expected to play every other day and shouldn't be able to complain about it. And thopse players wanting a Winter break can just go to hell. It is traditionally the time of the season where the fans have always looked forwards to, a tradition of the English game.

 

Let's look at some statistics. In the 1994-95 season when Blackburn won the league there were 22 teams in the top division of English football meaning each club played 42 league games. Man Utd got to the final against Everton that year and played 7 games in the process (replay in semi final). In the league cup they played 1 game against us and we beat them 2-0. There's the 50 game mark without considering Europe.In the champions league they played a further 6 games as they were knocked out of the group stage. Levelling up there extra league games that year with the knockout stages of the champions league then nothing really has changed very much. Nottingham Forest before them played a comparable number of games when they were successful. PLayers are not playing anymore football than they have previously in history and if anything they are playing less as managers opt for a rotation policy in many cases. It's only recently that substitutes have been allowed, and that squad size has been a considerations. Teams in the past have been known to win championships with squads of 14-15 players.

 

It shows to me that in the game we have far too many over-hyped, overpaid, premadonnas who think they are above the game and can dictate to the masses.

[Cronky]

The game is faster now and takes more out of the players. If we're going to see them at their peak, then they need proper recovery time. It also improves their quality if they can spend time training rather than just resting for the next game.

 

For me, it boils down to whether you want quality or quantity. Yes, we saw more football a few years ago, but the standard wasn't anything like as high as it is now.

[Guest thenorthumbrian]

The trouble with one or two Newcastle players in the last few years is that they haven't played any f****** football. 

[Dave]

They run around for 95 minutes. How long should that take to recover from?

[Guest nufc_geordie]

Boro chief against winter break

Steve Gibson

Gibson believes most players he knows want more, not less football

Middlesbrough chairman Steve Gibson insists demands for a Premier League winter break to help ease player burn-out are totally unjustified.

 

Players' union chief Gordon Taylor has led calls for a mid-season window while 13 of the 15 union reps who responded to a BBC Sport survey supported it.

 

But Gibson said: "I'd take some convincing about a two-week break.

 

"I've never heard anyone call football a daily grind. If they're tired rest them, that's why there are big squads."

 

Taylor has warned that the likes of Steven Gerrard and other England stars are facing burn-out because of the demands placed on them.

 

 

606: DEBATE

Burn out? Stop whinging and get on with it. If the top players aren't keen on the work I suggest they give up football and do a proper job

 

kingkippax

 

Gerrard has started six games in the last 18 days, including England's trip to Moscow and Liverpool's to Istanbul.

 

"If that was a racehorse you would say that was too much and have the RSPCA onto you," Taylor told BBC Sport.

 

But Gibson told BBC Radio 5 Live: "We are talking about fit young men who are very well pampered, have the best diet in world, travel to games in luxury surroundings.

 

"They stay in the best hotels, have the best doctors, physios, they have the best of everything.

 

"The problem at our football club is not the players who are playing but the ones who aren't and I haven't met a player yet who doesn't want more football."

 

And Gibson insists highly-paid professionals moaning about the physical demands of the game should feel more grateful for their "privileged profession".

 

"That's what the Premier League, international and European football is all about, the strongest teams winning with the strongest players.

 

"If the players aren't up to it they aren't up to it. There would be many players upset if they were forced to miss an international because someone perceived them to be tired.

 

"Any player complaining should come and do a 14-hour day in industrial Teesside. We're not asking them to go to Afghanistan or Iraq, we're asking them to play football."

 

Taylor insisted the biggest problem is with the country's elite players who "need the most looking after."

 

But Gibson added: "If that's the case they should tell Liverpool, Manchester United, Arsenal and Chelsea not to pick their international players and give them a rest.

 

"Or tell the FA not to have the piddling, silly friendlies that we seem to have littering the calendar."

 

Another man that thinks along the same lines as me. If Carlsberg made chairmen they would probably make Steve Gibson!

[Dave]

These threads need merging really.

[Skirge]

There are a lot of games played by top clubs with European football but a big squad should make it less harsh on players. Milner plays shedloads of games and you never see him whinging about it, I guess the older the player the more it takes it toll, Big Al gave up his international career to prolong his club career.

[Dave]

Shite like this in the week the Riise payslip came out just takes the piss. I don't have a particularly strenuous job by any means, but the people I pay graft from 8am til 4pm every day to earn a pittance in comparison. And even that's nothing compared to some public sector workers. These players have got it better than ever before, they (and those related to it) should shut the fuck up.

[GM]

It's so stressful though...such a stressful life the players have these days.

[Guest gggg]

They don't play enough. They don't even bother with the league cup and get 'rested' for league games anyway ffs

[Keefaz]

I don't think they play too much, but to say a Premier League game isn't hard work is just idiotic.

[Guest nufc_geordie]

I would never say 90 minutes of football at the top level isn't difficult but at the end of the day as Dave says, people work 9-5 grafting their arses off for a pittance in comparison and footballers really have no right to complain that they need a rest. We only get 4 weeks holiday a year, they get more over the summer.

[GM]

I don't think they play too much, but to say a Premier League game isn't hard work is just idiotic.

 

Never claimed it wasn't hard work, Keefaz. Just commented (albeit sardonically) that it must be very stressful being a highly paid footballer and all that...

[Keefaz]

I don't think they play too much, but to say a Premier League game isn't hard work is just idiotic.

 

Never claimed it wasn't hard work, Keefaz. Just commented (albeit sardonically) that it must be very stressful being a highly paid footballer and all that...

 

Didn't really mean you, GM. Just these things you hear bandied about. It may be true that a footballer would struggle doing a 14-hour shift in a plant, but how many plant workers could last even 10 minutes of a PL match?

[GM]

I don't think they play too much, but to say a Premier League game isn't hard work is just idiotic.

 

Never claimed it wasn't hard work, Keefaz. Just commented (albeit sardonically) that it must be very stressful being a highly paid footballer and all that...

 

Didn't really mean you, GM. Just these things you hear bandied about. It may be true that a footballer would struggle doing a 14-hour shift in a plant, but how many plant workers could last even 10 minutes of a PL match?

 

I get tired simply lifting another hamburger to my bloated face at lunchtime, tbh.

[Dave]

Keef, any plant worker could last it if they had the fitness, which can be achieved by just about anyone. These aren't superhumans. Would they have the will to work their socks off all day every single day just to scrape a living?

 

Not comparable imo.

[Keefaz]

Keef, any plant worker could last it if they had the fitness, which can be achieved by just about anyone. These aren't superhumans. Would they have the will to work their socks off all day every single day just to scrape a living?

 

Not comparable imo.

 

Surely they are both hard jobs in different ways? If being a top footballer was a piece of piss, we'd all be doing it. I'm not really sure what point Gibson was trying to make: the strain a footballer puts on his body is surely a hell of a lot more than your average labourer, isn't it?

[Dave]

Of course it's not a piece of piss, but the reason we're not all doing it is down to skill, touch, instinct etc, not purely the fitness. As I said, pretty much anyone can have that given time and money, both of which players have lots of.

 

Footballers have days to rest after every single exertion, I can't see how that compares to working day in day out. And they're not working for fun either, they work because they have to.

 

I don't begrudge the wages at all, but they should just get on with it imo.

[2sheds]

Imagine if factory workers had a squad rotation system where they could miss 50% of their shifts and still get paid?

 

Then if their shifts were spaced out to a maximum of two a week?

 

Then a factory worker turned in and was 'subbed' half way thru his shift and spent the rest of the time sitting on his arse watching his workmates graft?

 

Then if they turned around and complained of being 'tired'?

 

Bunch of whinging twats and thats regardless of the high wages.

 

[Keefaz]

Whether or not they are whinging twats has nowt to do with whether their bodies need a rest or not. It's stands to reason that a player can only perform to his best over a limited number of games per week. You can't tell me a player is going to perform at the same level if he's playing every night to the same player playing only once a week?

[Razor]

I voted no, but unless you are a professional footballer it is pretty hard to really know imo.

[GM]

You can't tell me a playa is going to perform at the same level if he's "playing" every night to the same playa "playing" only once a week?

 

Fo sho, it can get tiring.

[Dave]

[Keefaz]

[Guest Sniffer]

Let's face with it, with a handful of exceptions, most players are  just overpaid, soft tarts. And a lot of the foreign players are the softest of them all.