Man City and Chelsea stars to be asked about BOYCOTTING Club World Cup with players facing 'tipping point'

09/05/2024 06:00 AM

MANCHESTER City and Chelsea stars will be asked if they want to BOYCOTT next summer's Club World Cup unless Fifa strike a deal with players' leaders.

Less than 24 hours after world chiefs unveiled the new brand logo for the 32-team tournament due to be held in the USAnextsummer, the international players' union Fifpro published statistics showing how top stars are ALREADY overplayed.

SunSport revealed the potential strike threat, which would be backed by the PFA, earlier this year, despite both Chelsea and City in line for huge shares of a potential £600m prize pot.

And with legal action against Fifa having already been launched with the European courts, PFA boss Maheta Molango suggested he may have to go to the Stamford Bridge and Etihad dressing rooms to see if the players are serious about following through.

Molango said: "This is not an attack on Fifa or the Club World Cup but we have reached a tipping point.

"This will be the defining season for football. The calendar doesn't make any sense.

"We have been warning for a long time but this season we will have a very telling example of what is happening.

"Our legal case questions if there were potential breaches of the right to enjoy a holiday and if Fifa is abusing a dominant position.

"The players are conscious, across the pyramid, about the calendar.

“When people try to portray this as just about the elite players it's just not true. It is massive and goes beyond that.

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"But if Fifa are not prepared to talk, we will go back to the players and say to them 'we have done our bit; we are going to fight as hard as we can but ultimately this may require more from you'.

Former West Ham and Newcastle defender David Terrier, vice-president of the French players' union, added: "We brought the case to find out what the players want us to do. This is our work.

"After that we will come back to them and say, 'We've tried to fight and put on the table a solution for bargaining – but nobody wants to answer us.’

"So then the possibility we have is to decide together that we won't play – do you agree with that or not?

"We are not the players. We support them, fight for them and explain the situation to them.

“That is the last solution and not the one we want, but we do want to protect football."

The benefit of players having increased rest is no more clear and evident than with City hitman Erling Haaland, who has already hit two hat-tricks and scored seven goals so far this season.

And Molango believes City’s striker, along with Liverpool's Mohamed Salah, have done more for the future of every player than any lawyer in a suit could.

As he helped launch the international players' union FifPro's latest "Player Workload Monitoring Report", Molango was clear in his thinking.

Haaland's brilliant start to the new campaign, along with the blistering form of Liverpool's Egyptian king, is down to him not being as burned out as many of the Prem's other biggest names.

The subdued force who ended last season as a mere mortal has returned as football's version of RoboCop, an ice-cold penalty box killer.

Molango has not a shadow of a doubt as to why – his pre-season trips around Prem dressing rooms making it abundantly clear.

The PFA boss said: "What I found astonishing this summer was the difference in terms of the feedback from the people who had a proper holiday and those who did not.

We have reached a tipping point

Maheta Molango, CEO of the PFA

"The body language and the words they chose in talking to us was so different.

"In England, we have a very clear example, with Haaland.

"It’s very nice to go to a dressing room and hear someone say to you, 'I was missing being back.

“I was missing being able to train again. And I’m pumped up, I’m motivated. I’m here'. And that was in the preseason.

"Now you see the result. He is back to being the machine that we saw when he first joined us in England.

"It’s probably something very similar to Mo Salah. He had a proper rest and you can see it's the best version of Mo.

"That's what the fans want to see and what we as a union want to see as well.

"But the people who have not had that rest, you can see they look shattered. They look tired before even starting the season, which for us is very worrying."

The "workload" on top players is the key finding of FifPro's document.

A survey of 1500 players across Europe, mainly in the leading divisions, found more than half are already playing 50-plus games in a season.

Julian Alvarez, who left Manchester City for Atletico Madrid in the summer's biggest transfer, played in a staggering 75 games for club and country last term, with Phil Foden featuring 72 times, as did Liverpool's Luis Diaz and Darwin Nunes, while club-mate Cody Gakpo, Aston Villa's John McGinn and Arsenal's Kai Havertz walked onto the pitch at least 70 times each.

And that was before this season's expansion of the Champions League, potentially adding four more games, the Club World Cup that is due to feature up to seven games for City and Chelsea next summer and the 48-team 2026 World Cup.

FifPro previously pointed out that Jude Bellingham has played twice as many senior minutes as David Beckham had at the same age, while Spurs defender Cristian Romero travelled 105,000 miles – two and a half times round the earth – even though Tottenham were not in Europe.

Fifa are in FifPro's sights, the Club World Cup seen as a competition too far – especially as the union accuses world chiefs of "refusing" to even discuss the issue.

Legal action that has been launched in the European Court of Justice could end in the likes of Foden, Bellingham and Harry Kane being asked if they are prepared to take strike action rather than fly out to the USA next June.

Former Arsenal and Liverpool performance coach Darren Burgess explained: "Young players are still growing into their mid-20s.

"We know that putting them through this stress is placing them at increased risks but the levels of games have so startlingly increased over the past 20 years that we don't know what this might do to our young stars.

"That's the scariest part – that there are no safeguards. The science tells us that they are still growing and putting them under more load generally leads to injury."

Molango, though, believes there is a wider problem that MUST be addressed.

He added: "The domestic calendar hasn't changed over the last 20 years. It is not the issue because it is the bread and butter for players.

"A big proportion of their money comes from domestic TV contracts and it is important to protect the domestic pyramid.

“That's something they strongly feel about. We need to protect the players from themselves.

“They love playing, they are committed to playing and they don’t want to lose their starting spot.

"But the fans are paying 100 per cent prices and not seeing 100 per cent of the show.

"We think there should be a maximum number of games, between 50 and 60 per season, which can vary depending on your age.

"But players must not play more than five or six games back to back and they must be allowed a minimum three weeks of complete rest in the summer.

"In the past, when we talked about this, it was us saying how it 'feels'.

"But this is science talking, a report from people – players and coaches – who have first-hand experience.

"Players are at the 'red limit'. If we want to protect the show, we must protect the players."