Endless quest for overseas markets makes mockery of winter burnout pleas

Within the next 12 months there will be calls for a winter break. Be it when we reach the depths of mid winter looking across the North Sea to German sides take a five week hiatus or after next year's World Cup in which England inevitably make a swift exit to a country whose finest player's primary occupation is warming the bench for a mid table Championship side. Its reappearance as a topic of debate is inevitable.

Whether or not there is a burnout in Premier League players come May is a question I am unable to answer. Football is a sport where players have to peak week in week out often twice a week, where each game is built up to be as important as the last. The true effects of the rigours of elite professional football is a debate for another day but the power of any arguments pushing for the introduction of a winter break are increasingly diminished by the promotional cash grab of the endless charade of the pre and post season tours.

International tours have long been a staple of Premier League sides as they look to spread their gospel overseas as part of the process of whipping their players into shape in the few weeks before the whole charade resumes again in August. The fitness of players is crucial both for performance and injury prevention and pre season is central to this. However, in the past few seasons international tours seem to have kicked up a gear both in terms of the the number of games and air miles whilst their timing have gradually shifted to take up more and more of the summer. Within days of the end of the season Spurs and Liverpool jetted to the other side of the world to play friendlies to packed stadia in Hong Kong and Australia, whilst China, USA, Singapore and Iceland are just a few of the far flung lands which will host top English sides in friendlies with Europe's elite over the coming month or so. There is nothing inherently wrong with tours but as the Premier League and its clubs become increasingly engaged in promotional activities abroad aiming to corner off their own section of a lucrative overseas market the claims of player burn out seem hypocritical. We are constantly informed about how hard players are being worked on the football pitch and barely a week goes by anymore where football isn't being played thanks in part to endless tour matches. If clubs were so concerned about player health then post season matches wouldn't be a thing. Maybe one of the challenges to England's international performance and the health of players could be the sheer number of extra games which are being crammed in in pursuit of an extra buck. On the one hand sides and managers cry foul in the depths of winter as their players struggle to compete twice a week for months on end but clubs are more than happy to throw them onto a plane to spend an extra couple of weeks promoting the club's brand to adoring Korean, Thai or even Tanzanian sides.

A winter break may serve to accommodate these overseas exploits (as could a removal of FA Cup replays) when ultimately one of the most effective ways of reducing burnout out could just be to ensure that the Premier League promotional tour - undertaken by the choice of individual clubs - does not take up such a lengthy period. Axing football over the Christmas period - a central pillar of English football culture - due to pressures that players need more time to rest seems hypocritical at best when stars are being paraded around the grounds of Asia and the Americas in May and for most of the summer for that matter and yet it is quite unlikely that reining in a cash cow is high on a globally competitive Premier League's agenda. I personally believe that the failings of the national side lie beyond the energy levels of players but altering the season to accommodate a winter break on the basis of exhaustion would seem either misjudged or misguided when so much time is increasingly dedicated to reaching into every crevasse of possible cash opportunities.

#Winterbreak #Friendlies #PremierLeague #England