When Rodri fell to the Etihad pitch on Sunday clutching his right knee, many recalled his words from five days earlier about the saturation of the footballing calendar: “I think it’s too much. Someone has to look after us, because we are the protagonists of this sport, or business, or whatever you want to call it,” he said. And the possibility of players going on strike was mentioned as a pressure measure to try to force a change: “I think we are close to that. It’s easy to understand. If you ask any player, they will say the same. It’s a general opinion of the players. If this continues, there will come a time when we will have no other option.”
The statements by the Manchester City and Spanish national team player were not only a personal complaint, but one of the clearest signs of the change in strategy by footballers in the face of saturation. The number of matches is increasing this season with the start of the Club World Cup, the new format of the Champions League and the extra round of the quarter-finals of the Nations League. In addition to protests such as those by Rodri, several footballers’ unions have launched a legal battle through various channels that for the moment is aimed at FIFA.
One of the main drivers of this path is the English players’ union, the PFA, which together with the French union hired a few months ago Jean-Louis Dupont, one of the lawyers who won the famous Bosman case in 1995. In mid-June they filed a complaint in a Brussels commercial court together with the European section of Fifpro, the international union – which shares the presidency with the French one – and to which the Italians joined. This was the first part of a legal offensive against FIFA that will continue on October 14 with a complaint to the European Commission.
Both paths follow the legal path opened by the promoters of the Super League, which ended last December with a favourable ruling by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU). As then, when A22 went to a commercial court in Madrid to protect itself, Dupont asked the Brussels judge to refer a preliminary question to the CJEU. The PFA believes that the introduction of the new FIFA Club World Cup could constitute a violation of the rights of players according to the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, and that it could even go against European competition laws. They want the CJEU to clarify the scope of the Community framework on the right to holidays and collective bargaining before the Brussels judge rules. What they have not done is request the precautionary suspension of the Club World Cup.
In addition to this path, the PFA and the French union are currently finalising a complaint to the European Commission to formally question FIFA being both the regulator of world football and the organiser of competitions. The scheme not only recalls the approach taken by the promoters of the Super League with UEFA: “If the December ruling on the Super League had not taken place, this would be more complicated.” Several national championships have joined this path, including LaLiga, whose president, Javier Tebas, was so critical of the ideologues of that project.
In this case, he has a clear objective, which even leads him, as a representative of the employers, to support a possible strike by the workers: “If this strike serves to solve the issue of the calendars, but not to remove clubs from the national leagues, but so that the Club World Cup does not exist, then it is welcome, because something has to happen.”
The president of AFE, the Spanish footballers’ union, David Aganzo, does not rule out a strike either, although he is very cautious about it: “We have to see. We support Rodri, but we are here to inform and protect on the legal side. They cannot go on an illegal strike. We have been working for a long time,” he says. And he takes the opportunity to send a message to Tebas: “Now that he is talking about the health of the footballers, I hope he has forgotten about the matches outside Spain, in the USA. I am glad.”
For Maheta Molango, president of the PFA, the essential change is the step forward of the players: “The most important players have taken responsibility. And they have a powerful voice. We are happy to listen to Rodri, De Bruyne, David Raya,” he says. The Arsenal goalkeeper supported the union’s movements a few weeks ago at the last training camp with the Spanish national team: “We fully trust that they are looking out for our interests. They are the ones who are looking out for us and are doing everything they can to help us.”
Fifpro’s latest annual report includes a summary of the relationship between overload and injury from Dr John Kiely, Associate Professor in Human Performance and Innovation at the University of Limerick & Orreco: “Matches every three days, travel across multiple time zones, media stress, squad pressure, sleep problems and excessive minutes of play without adequate recovery. This mix of external loads and internal psycho-emotional challenges creates the Perfect Storm: causing inflammation, increased tissue sensitivity, generating energy waste that impairs neuromuscular signals and distorts our assessments of ability and competence,” he explains. He adds: “At a micro level, learned movements become more irregular. The finesse of movement deteriorates. Errors accumulate. At a macro level, habitual movements change as their quality deteriorates and our perception of risk becomes less reliable.”
Apart from the footballers, the problems with their physical and mental health have an impact on the industry, as Molango explains: “It affects the quality of the product we see.” This is something that Dani Carvajal has pointed out on several occasions in recent months: “It is impossible for us to maintain an optimal level and maximum performance with so much travel; with the Intercontinental Cup, a Club Super World Cup that at the end of the season takes you away from home for a month, crossing a continent and with FIFA dates in between.”
The president of the French union and of the European section of Fifpro, David Terrier, also welcomes the reaction of the players: “The players understand that it is not just about them, it is about football. If we continue like this, we will destroy the football industry. Enough is enough,” he says. “France is the best example. Canal + has said: ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t have money for Ligue 1, because I pay 480 million for the new Champions League’. I am not worried about the big clubs. The problem is for the medium and small ones. There is less money for the League.”
This type of analysis is beginning to change the way footballers see the calendar, which used to think that it was the problem of a few. In England, for example, with the extra dates of the Champions League, the replays, the cup play-off matches that meant big revenues for small teams, are disappearing this year. “I wouldn’t say certain things if I didn’t go to the dressing rooms and talk to the players,” says Molango. This solidarity has underpinned the legal offensive of the PFA and the French union, which the AFE has not joined: “We understand that just as we go after FIFA, we should go after UEFA,” says Aganzo to explain why they have not joined the demands. Terrier explains that for the moment UEFA is showing more signs of listening than FIFA.
But no one is ruling out a strike, which they say has growing support from the players, although the French unionist points to the possibility of pre-match protests: “The players can sit on the pitch before the kick-off, or they can delay their appearance on the pitch by 15 minutes. We are going to take it step by step. But if in the end the players say they don’t want to play…” Molango also says that this is a real possibility: “Nothing can be ruled out.”
Aganzo also sees this trend growing, although he prefers caution: “Footballers have the strength, but it must be measured well,” he says. Although he warns: “We are preparing ourselves so that things change.”
