FIFPro sounds alarm over player workloads ahead of Champions League final

Global players' union FIFPro has sounded the alarm over the damaging impact on professional footballers of playing too many matches in a report released Thursday, ahead of this weekend's Champions League final between Liverpool and Real Madrid in Paris.

FIFpro's Player Workload Monitoring report focuses on the findings of a survey carried out between October and December 2021 of 1,055 professional male players aged 18 and older, as well as of 92 high-performance coaches.

The survey asked questions of the demands of playing too many games and not having long enough rest periods in between, with 88 percent of coaches believing players should not play more than 55 matches per season.

Saturday's final will see Liverpool stars Sadio Mane and Mohamed Salah play their 70th matches this season, starting with pre-season, according to analysis by FIFPro and Football Benchmark.

Over 60 percent of those matches were in what is known as the critical zone, defined as when players have had less than five days' rest beforehand and are therefore more susceptible to muscle injuries.

Mane and Salah have travelled an average of 90,000 kilometres each to represent their club and national teams this season, the analysis shows, while Real Madrid duo Eder Militao and Vinicius Junior have travelled 128,000 kilometres each, mostly to play for Brazil.

For Liverpool, who have already won the English League Cup and FA Cup, Saturday's final will be their 63rd competitive outing of the campaign.

According to FIFPro's report, 54 percent of players said they had suffered an injury due to schedule overload, while 82 percent of coaches said they observed mental health issues in players caused by playing too many games.

It cites the example of Mikel Oyarzabal, the