According to statistics from Transfermarkt, since joining Man City in 2019, before this season, Rodri has only missed 5 matches. The Spanish midfielder is considered immune to injury, but right now, he may be facing the prospect of being out until the summer of 2025.
In just the past few months, the 28-year-old star has been knocked out twice in a row by pain. His endurance has reached its limit and if it weren't for this ACL injury, it's unknown when the EURO 2024 champion would have had a break.
During a livestream with Spanish streamer Ibai Llanos, Real Madrid goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois shared that what Rodri said was true, referring to the fact that players now have to play continuously.
"People say we earn a lot of money so we have no right to complain. This is true but we need to find a balance. Even the best players cannot play continuously at high intensity" - Courtois shared.
Agreeing with Courtois, current Chelsea manager Enzo Maresca said that in terms of the number of matches, there are currently too many. Maresca said that he will do everything to protect the players and that the current volume of matches is completely wrong.
That is a matter for the players and coaches. As for UEFA and FIFA, the idea of reducing the number of matches never seemed to cross the minds of the managers of the two biggest football organizations on the planet.
"It's too easy to criticize UEFA and FIFA. Sometimes people think simply like this, if you play less matches, you get less money. I think the people who should complain are the workers who are only paid about 1,000 Euros/month" - UEFA President, Aleksander Ceferin shared.
"One of the most important things in the present and future of football is to protect the health and well-being of players. The proposal to reduce the intensity of matches may be recalculated based on the breaks and preparation time required for each match," FIFA said.
Although FIFA is not as extreme as UEFA, the expansion of the FIFA Club World Cup format, which will start in the summer of 2025, is a statement that they will not do anything different from UEFA in this matter. For English teams, having to play the FIFA Club World Cup in 2025 could be a disaster. If they reach the final of all tournaments this season, Man City will have to play 75 matches, the number is 74 for Chelsea.
With some of Man City's stars being the core of the national team such as Bernardo Silva (Portugal), plus 10 international matches taking place during the season, the maximum number of matches to be played could be 85, an average of 4 days/match, lasting from August 2024 to July 2025.
Last week, Rodri shared that the reasonable number of matches for a player in a season would be between 40 and 50. Any more matches in that range would be too much.
The idea that players can’t complain about earning too much money isn’t necessarily a good one. Clubs don’t want to pay hundreds of thousands of pounds a week to players who are often bedridden. Lower-level players who play more and contribute more are paid less. This creates an imbalance.
Even highly paid players are afraid of serious injuries because after recovering, they may never return to their old form. Earning a lot of money in a short time but then losing form miserably is not a good scenario.
Despite the players’ complaints, the trend of increasing the number of matches will not stop. Statistics show that each year, more than 1,000 EFL matches are broadcast live on TV channels in England. The number of youth matches has also increased, forcing many young players to leave the youth leagues early to play in the professional leagues.
Every fever eventually dies down and the current constant increase in the number of matches will eventually come to an end. However, that day will only come when the number of spectators decreases due to boredom with football. Otherwise, as long as fans continue to watch in large numbers, the leagues will not miss this opportunity to make a profit. Cases like Rodri will come more often.
