Football governing bodies FIFA and UEFA have been called to make some key changes for players following Arsenal star Bukayo Saka’s injury.
The Gunners will be battling through the coming weeks and months of the season without one of their most important players after Mikel Arteta gave an update on the 23-year-old.
It was revealed that Saka tore his hamstring in the match with Crystal Palace, with the winger facing “many weeks” out of action.
That came as a huge blow to both Arsenal and the player himself, who is now facing a long recovery to make a return.
With that said, FIFA and UEFA have been called to make a key change for the sake of Bukayo Saka and other players.
One of the more topical discussions currently ongoing in football surrounds the workload the very top footballers face.
Plenty of competitions are adding even more fixtures to the schedule, with the hectic nature of it causing some to play as much as once every three days.
UEFA have added more games to the new Champions League format, off the back of a gruelling European Championship campaign that saw some players feature for nearly a whole year if they made it deep in the competition.
On top of that, an expanded World Cup and Club World Cup proposed by FIFA only condenses the schedule further.
As player welfare becomes a hot topic again, journalist Henry Winter has called on action to be taken after Saka’s injury.
Taking to X, he said: “Wishing Bukayo Saka a swift recovery. And wishing Fifa and Uefa would wake up to PFA and Fifpro warnings over player workload.
“Saka’s played 144 games for Arsenal and England since August 2022, often the full 90 minutes and frequently at high intensity. Something was always going to give.
“Saka’s hamstring has now given way and he will be out for ‘many weeks’, Mikel Arteta says. Frustrating for player, club and country.
“Players are very well-paid, and get the best medical care, but they remain flesh and blood, bone and soft tissue. The intense season with more and more fixtures, and with no winter break, means thoroughbred players will continue to go lame. We wouldn’t treat racehorses like this.”
While it can be argued that greater rotation may have helped, the competitive nature of the industry rarely allows managers to rest their best players.
So far this season, Arteta has made it very clear that the fixture schedule is an issue for him and his players.
The occasional jibe at having to play every three games has shown the frustration with being forced to move around so quickly with little time to rest.
Speaking after the injury to Saka, the Arsenal manager was quizzed on whether he feels the schedule impacts injuries.
He responded: “Yeah, but it’s probably more the accumulation of seasons. You know, for example, Bukayo and Declan they played over 130 games in two seasons.
“So what’s gonna happen in the second one, the third one or the fourth one, if that continues the same way? Probably it’s unsustainable, unless we find ways to, yeah, physically turn them into monsters, you know, that they can cope with anything.
“Because the fact that you train and recover is not a good pattern. Because that means that you don’t train and the body needs to train, the muscle needs to train.
“You just play and recover, you start to lose a lot of factors, a lot of qualities within your body, the physical aspects that are key to performance.
“Not just to play, not to get injured, but to become a better athlete, which is very different and keep evolving as an athlete, and that’s a challenge, but okay, we’re trying to find ways to do it.”
While the club are trying to find ways to do it, the fixture schedule is pushing people beyond their physical limits.