GRAVY PLANE
Big Six clocking up 90,000 AIR MILES taking tired players to flog shirts and brands in USA, Australia & China...
THE big clubs are clocking up the air miles and trousering mounds of cash – but at what cost to their Premier League title hopes?
Within days of reporting for pre-season training – at least those who weren’t still involved in the Copa America, the CONCACAF Gold Cup or the Africa Cup of Nations – the players were collecting their passports before setting off to the USA, China, Australia or other far-off destinations.
Before a ball has been kicked in the Premier League the big six of Manchester City, Liverpool, Chelsea, Tottenham, Arsenal and Manchester United would have travelled around 90,000 miles.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s great explorers lead the way on 20,314 miles. Next are Spurs with 15,260 miles followed by Arsenal ( 14,442), Manchester City (14,274), Chelsea (13,553) and Liverpool (10,230).
Deep- vein thrombosis from excessive air travel seems as big a pre-season worry as pulling a calf or hamstring for today’s stars.
Even Arsene Wenger had to give way to the Arsenal boardroom bean-counters in his final few years at the Emirates.
The seasons of success for the Frenchman had traditionally been honed with a training camp in Austria, followed by a low-key friendly against Barnet and a tournament in North London.
But even he was forced to conform to the modern trend of traversing the globe in search of the dollar, yen or renminbi.
Antonio Conte complained about Chelsea’s pre- season tour to Singapore and China in his second season at Stamford
Bridge, insisting too many of his players would be starting their title defence fatigued.
Chelsea ended up fifth and the Italian lost his job.
Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp is the latest high-profile manager to warn of the danger of player burn-out.
With football almost a 12-months a year business, Klopp said: “It looks like no one can imagine a week without football. We have to change it. We need to calm this down.”
That would need the top clubs’ hierarchies to acknowledge that it might help the coffers to schedule lucrative pre-season tours which sell shirts and ‘expand the brand’, but doesn’t help the well-being of their well-rewarded stars.
Klopp (below) admits he will have to carefully manage Sadio Mane, who has been on a 13-month run of football. It only ended on July 19 when Senegal lost in the final of the Africa Cup of Nations against an Algeria side containing Manchester City’s Riyad Mahrez. It appears that the biggest break a top international player can enjoy is around three weeks, which has some managers including City’s Pep Guardiola (below) feeling a little apprehensive. Guardiola said: “We must not forget that we’re about to start a new season and yet Riyad Mahrez has only just finished the last one.”
Managers like Guardiola are under increasing pressure in the weeks leading up to the start of the domestic season because of the growing stature of warm-up tournaments.
The International Champions Cup now spreads across the USA, Singapore and China and can’t no longer be dismissed as irrelevant – not with crowds of 70,000 on occasions. There’s no shortage of fans watching every move of the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Eden Hazard and Paul Pogba, with Juventus, Real Madrid and Manchester United among the clubs. New Chelsea boss Frank Lampard had barely sealed his Bridge return before he had games against the likes of Barcelona in Japan.
Friendlies have come a long way since the days when lower-league clubs could regularly expect a money-spinner with their local giants.
Most big clubs are miles away lining their pockets. Payback could arrive later in the season with a meltdown from overload.