THE ARROGANCE OF FOOTBALL

‘People in this game live in a bubble. They think they are above society’

ANOTHER day in lockdown, another date for your football diary. On Thursday, it emerged that UEFA were promoting Saturday, August 29 for the Champions League final in Istanbul, with the Europa League final three days earlier.

This, after the expressed desire for the big domestic leagues to finish their campaigns by July 31.

There could be more to follow this week when the next pronouncement emanates from the European game’s governing body.

The message, to the disbelieving ears of Raymond Verheijen, over the last six weeks has been clear. We are football. And we are better than all the rest.

Verheijen, former Wales assistant manager and conditioning expert of Manchester City and Barcelona, has long been a vocal critic of managers ignoring the intricacies of periodisation.

That too many elite clubs take the wrong approach to training methods for their overworked athletes.

But football’s efforts to return their star performers to prominence amid a global pandemic has, for Verheijen, elevated the arrogance of the sport to a new level.

While contingency measures, understandably, must be considered in all sports, it is the seemingly

desperate scramble to find time and places to cram in games and finish seasons that Verheijen (pictured) feels is becoming too unedifying.

The 48-year-old Dutchman has spoken to numerous footballers about the crisis and heard a sliding scale of concerns.

Financially-independent players, he said, were worried only for health. Others discussed the prospect of their clubs going to the wall and losing their income.

All will surely share the same fears, however, if there is success for the football authorities in pushing for the action to begin again.

The rush to be ready in certain countries has gone too far, according to Verheijen, when there is a welter of advice that social distancing to a significant level will need to stay in place until a coronavirus vaccine is found.

He stressed: ‘If football stays within society, then we will not play for the rest of the year.

‘But what I see is football fighting to get a special place, to receive special treatment.

‘Because not playing football is a logical consequence of social distancing and, in my country and others, social distancing will probably remain until the end of the year.

‘You often see people in the football world living in their own little bubble because they are always treated like idols.

‘In their brain, they develop the perception that they are very special and outside or above society. You now see the symptoms of that. ‘There are people who believe they should be allowed to play football tomorrow. That you and I cannot touch each other but that they should be allowed to play.

‘That can only mean they think they are more special than you and me. Football is not outside society. It is an integral part of it. You need a consistent message.

‘But playing football in an empty stadium for TV sends a conflicting message, which means you reduce the chance of people applying social distancing.’

When the English Premier League convened on Friday there was talk of testing players in their cars on arrival when training resumes, with a return date for games as late as August mooted, such is the eagerness to ensure 2019-20 is completed at some point in time.

In Germany, there has been a phased return to training in small groups and a host of precautions in place at Bundesliga clubs.

Italy hopes players can be tested for coronavirus at the start of next month in preparation for a Serie A comeback.

But any move on to matches will create a protocol minefield that Verheijen believes cannot work until a vaccine is fully operational.

‘In some countries, if football gets the special treatment in that you are allowed to ignore social distancing, then what they will do is test players every three days, like in Germany,’ declared Verheijen.

‘In countries where they think they can play without fans by just testing players every three days, that will be a league with a lot of incidents.

‘There will be infections. Some people say you have to deal with it this way, others say another way. You’ll go from incident to incident.

‘Play for three months with 20 teams, there’s no way everyone will stay clean. There will be infections. What are you going to do next?

‘You will start playing again, you think football is above nature, you try to suppress the laws of nature. But nature will catch up with you.

‘You have to accept nature, just like society does. Accept social distancing and wait for a vaccine. And, once there is a vaccine, this is a different story.’

Jumping the gun, he insisted, will only make players uncomfortable and fearful of the virus when exposed to the relative normality of playing games for the first time since early March.

‘The best player in one team gets an infection. He’s not allowed to play any more. If that player has to go home so he can’t participate any more, it means that team is now weakened,’ said Verheijen.

‘Should the weakened team continue? And what about his team-mates?

‘Or just imagine that you have to play against this team. The same team that maybe has some players who might also be infected by now?

‘I know for a fact that not every footballer will be comfortable with this.

‘Another team has three infections, so will they play the last five games without them? Should they pull out? Or are we stopping the league again? The snowball starts to roll.

They live in their own little bubble and think they are very special

‘What will happen if a player says: “I don’t want to take any risks”? Do people respect that? Is he now someone who lets down the team?

‘Every one of these scenarios will happen. So until there is a vaccine, there will either be no football, or there will be football with a lot of incidents.’

During the English Premier League’s latest round of discussions, the section on player safety stressed that testing would only be done when that facility was widely available for the public.

In Scotland, meanwhile, such complex planning scenarios have at least been avoided with the calling of three lower leagues and the top flight booked to follow if UEFA’s blessing arrives.

For players here, however, a scrapped season results in a longer lay-off from competitive action.

St Mirren beat Hearts on Wednesday, March 11 and the rest of the Premiership last played on the weekend of March 7 and 8.

When it is deemed safe for Scottish football to resume, players face the challenge of tackling a pre-season after potentially being absent for anything from four to nine months.

Verheijen explained some of the difficulties that lie ahead for our players currently holed up at home and restricted to house gym and running routines.

‘To be football fit from a physiological point of view, you must be football fit from an anatomical point of view,’ he said.

‘That is ligaments, tendons, joints. In football, you have to decelerate abruptly then accelerate, to change direction instantly, which means that ligaments and tendons are stretched.

‘When players start to play again after this break, I promise you, they will have significantly more muscle soreness and tendon inflammation than they normally have.

‘It will be in tendons under their kneecap, Achilles, all kinds of soreness.

‘They have to develop their brain back to make it football-ready. If you play at a high level, it also requires a certain brain state.

‘They must suppress pain, fatigue and emotions of disappointment. That is an ability of the brain that players have to develop again.

‘For players who return from injury, it’s one of the things they struggle with once they start playing and training with the team again. Making the brain ready.’

Meantime, it’s over to UEFA and their latest raft of recommendations and scheduling for club and international football.

‘What I think they and national federations will do is try to stay in the news, pressure governments,’ added Verheijen.

‘They know that, unless they get special treatment, they won’t play until the end of the year.

‘Because social distancing won’t disappear. They will only be allowed to play if governments give them permission to play.’