FIFPRO report highlights workload imbalance problem in women's game

Dec 12 : Women's soccer is grappling with a peculiar problem where elite players are burning out from packed schedules whereas others are struggling with too few matches, creating injury risks at both ends of the spectrum.

A new FIFPRO report on women's player workload monitoring released on Friday revealed that match loads are surging at the soccer pyramid's peak, with top players juggling more games for club and country while getting less recovery time.

However, the flip side presents an equally troubling picture where domestic leagues with insufficient fixtures are failing players through "underload".

"We talk a lot about the players who are exposed to a high workload and that's primarily because they are the highest profile players. We need to keep them fit because they're what people want to watch," Alex Culvin, FIFPRO's director of women's football, told reporters.

"But at the opposite end of the spectrum, the players who are underloaded are at risk - if not more at risk - for injury.

"There was a study done and it said if players are playing less than 25 games a season, they're more likely to be at risk for certain types of injury."

STARK DISPARITIES IN ELITE LEAGUES

FIFPRO's research uncovered stark disparities even within elite competitions among the top divisions in Europe.

In Germany and France's top leagues, players manage no more than 14 matches across all competitions on average, which translates to roughly one-and-a-half games a month during the season.

England's Women's Super League also illustrated the development gap where an Arsenal first-team player accumulated 13 more full matches worth of playing time than their second-tier Crystal Palace counterpart.

This lack of meaningful match time creates a vicious