Football players are threatening legal action over the increasing match demands placed on their bodies with new and expanding competitions, their union has told Sky News.
The welfare warning follows our analysis finding a male player could be required for an unprecedented 86 matches from next season with the UEFA Champions League adding games and FIFAintroducing a new summer competition for clubs.
The congested fixture list leaves players with little space for rest and recovery with FIFA yet to grant union demands for a mandatory 28-day off-season break.
Image: Maheta Molango called the additional games ‘a defeat for football’
Professional Footballers’ Association chief executive Maheta Molango told Sky News: “I feel like we’ve reached a stage where people are ready to take legal action, where people are ready to take tangible action on the pitch to try to resolve it, because it’s a sad state of affairs.
“I think it’s a defeat for football when the players need to take the justice in their own hands because they don’t feel protected.”
The concerns are magnified by FIFA introducing a new 32-team Club World Cup in 2025 when most Premier League players would be on holiday.
The 2025-26 Premier League campaign could start barely a month later and that season ends with another World Cup – for national teams – and the first since FIFA expanded it from 32 to 48 nations.
Asked if competition organisers risk killing football, Mr Molango responded: “I think they are. But I think that the players are ready now to take a strong stance.
“I do think that the authorities who are supposed to protect the players and protect the games are not doing that. They are generating more competitions, generating more income to the detriment of the players.”
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Growing the game
FIFA maintains its new Club World Cup – featuring 12 teams from Europe, including at least Manchester City and Chelsea from England – is about growing the game globally.
The world governing body points to the backing of the European Club Association, although that organisation’s support came amid a deal to help sell commercial rights with FIFA.
But Premier League chief executive Richard Masters has protested about the new tournament in a letter to FIFA through the World Leagues Forum (WLF), which he also leads.
Sky News understands the WLF claimed FIFA is overlooking the needs of national competitions by overloading the calendar and prioritising its own interests and events over governing the sport.
FIFA, under Gianni Infantino since 2016, has been seeking a bigger footprint on football and more and bigger tournaments.
Mr Molango said: “What we all seem to forget is that ultimately, they’re all using the same assets – and I’m using the word assets for purpose because they all want to milk the same cow.
“And it’s just impossible because ultimately, the players – for as much as they are privileged people who make a very good living – the human body only allows you to do so much.”
Manchester City could face 86-game season
This is what could be required of a Manchester City player in the 2024-25 season – with 86 games potentially in total.
If City are English and European champions again, they will be contesting the domestic Community Shield and UEFA Super Cup in August around the start of the 38-game Premier League season.
Then comes the launch of the new-look Champions League with the group stage growing from six to eight games between September and December.
Image: Man City could face an 86-game season due to the expansion of two tournaments
National teams will also have a pair of games in September, October and November.
December will see another FIFA launch, with the Intercontinental Cup final contested by the European champions.
January will see the start of the FA Cup and a maximum of six games to win it – assuming replays are scrapped to address congestion concerns.
There have been talks about the League Cup switching to single semi-finals rather than playing over two legs – although City could still face five games in total with a run to the final.
February could see a team facing a new Champions League playoff round to reach the last-16 of the knockout stage if they are not among the top eight teams in the reformatted group stage.
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That means it could now take 17 matches to win Europe’s top prize rather than the 13 fixtures in City’s journey to glory last season.
And once the Champions League final is played on 31 May in Munich, players are far from being able to rest.
The ninth and tenth national-team games of the season will be played which, for some, could be the Nations League finals – an addition to the calendar since being launched by UEFA in 2018.
And that brings us to 15 June and the start of the Club World Cup.
After a three-team group stage, there will be another four matches up to the final.
The competition is taking the quadrennial slot used up to 2017 for the now-defunct, eight-country Confederations Cup that served as a World Cup test event.
Image: Champions League group stages will go from six to eight games
But the union feels its alarm about the burden on players was disregarded by FIFA with little time for recovery and a pre-season before the 2025-26 season has to begin.
It is a quandary football must address – the more matches for players the less likely they could be fit to play them all.
“It’s yet another example of authorities making decisions without contemplating what the consequences would be for player welfare,” said Mr Molango, who sits on the board of international union FIFPRO.
“This is a defeat for football. As fans we want to see the best players on the pitch and performing at the best level.
“And right now with the current calendar it is physically, humanly impossible.”
Additional reporting by sports producer Tyrone Francis
A 15-year-old boy who was operated on twice by a now unlicensed Great Ormond Street surgeon is living with “continuous” pain.
Finias Sandu has been told by an independent review the procedures he underwent on both his legs were “unacceptable” and “inappropriate” for his age.
The teenager from Essex was born with a condition that causes curved bones in his legs.
Aged seven, a reconstructive procedure was carried out on Finias’s left leg, lengthening the limb by 3.5cm.
A few years later, the same operation was carried out on his right leg which involved wearing an invasive and heavy metal frame for months.
He has now been told by independent experts these procedures should not have taken place and concerns have been raised over a lack of imaging being taken prior to the operations.
Image: Yaser Jabbar rescinded his UK medical licence last year. Pic: LinkedIn
His doctor at London’s prestigious Great Ormond Street Hospital was former consultant orthopaedic surgeon Yaser Jabbar. Sky News has spoken to others he treated.
Mr Jabbar also did not arrange for updated scans or for relevant X-rays to be conducted ahead of the procedures.
The surgeries have been found to have caused Finias “harm” and left him in constant pain.
“The pain is there every day, every day I’m continuously in pain,” he told Sky News.
“It’s not something really sharp, although it does get to a certain point where it hurts quite a lot, but it’s always there. It just doesn’t leave, it’s a companion to me, just always there.”
Mr Jabbar rescinded his UK medical licence in January last year after working at Great Ormond Street between 2017 and 2022.
The care of his 700-plus patients is being assessed, with some facing corrective surgery, among them Finias.
“Trusting somebody is hard to do, knowing what they have done to me physically and emotionally, you know, it’s just too much to comprehend for me,” he said.
“It wasn’t something just physically, like my leg pain and everything else. It was emotionally, because I put my trust in that specific doctor. My parents and I don’t really understand the more scientific terms, we just went by what he said.”
Doctors refused to treat Finias because of his surgeries
Finias and his family relocated to their native Romania soon after the reconstructive frame was removed from his right leg in the summer of 2021.
The pain worsened and they sought advice from doctors in Romania, who refused to treat Finias because of the impact of his surgeries.
Dozens of families seeking legal claims
His mother Cornelia Sandu is “furious” and feels her trust in the hospital has been shattered. They are now among dozens of families seeking legal claims.
Cyrus Plaza from Hudgell Solicitors is representing the family. He said: “In cases where it has been identified that harm was caused, we want to see Great Ormond Street Hospital agreeing to pay interim payments of compensation for the children, so that if they need therapy or treatment now, they can access it.”
Finias is accessing therapy and mental health support as he prepares for corrective surgery later in the year.
A spokesperson for Great Ormond Street Hospital told Sky News: “We are deeply sorry to Finias and his family, and all the patients and families who have been impacted.
“We want every patient and family who comes to our hospital to feel safe and cared for. We will always discuss concerns families may have and, where they submit claims, we will work to ensure the legal process can be resolved as quickly as possible.”
Image: Finias with his mother and sister
Service not ‘safe for patients’
Sky News has attempted to contact Mr Jabbar.
An external review into the wider orthopaedic department at the hospital began in September 2022.
It was commissioned after the Royal College of Surgeons warned the hospital’s lower limb reconstruction service was not “safe for patients or adequate to meet demand”.
The investigation is expected to be completed by the end of the year.
Sir Keir Starmer has said closer ties with the EU will be good for the UK’s jobs, bills and borders ahead of a summit where he could announce a deal with the bloc.
The government is set to host EU leaders in London on Monday as part of its efforts to “reset” relations post-Brexit.
A deal granting the UK access to a major EU defence fund could be on the table, according to reports – but disagreements over a youth mobility scheme and fishing rights could prove to be a stumbling block.
The prime minister has appeared to signal a youth mobility deal could be possible, telling The Times that while freedom of movement is a “red line”, youth mobility does not come under this.
His comment comes after Kaja Kallas, the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs, said on Friday work on a defence deal was progressing but “we’re not there yet”.
Sir Keir met European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen later that day while at a summit in Albania.
Image: Ursula von der Leyen and Sir Keir had a brief meeting earlier this week. Pic: PA
Sir Keir said: “First India, then the United States – in the last two weeks alone that’s jobs saved, faster growth and wages rising.
“More money in the pockets of British working people, achieved through striking deals not striking poses.
“Tomorrow, we take another step forward, with yet more benefits for the United Kingdom as the result of a strengthened partnership with the European Union.”
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Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has said she is “worried” about what the PM might have negotiated.
Ms Badenoch – who has promised to rip up the deal with the EU if it breaches her red lines on Brexit – said: “Labour should have used this review of our EU trade deal to secure new wins for Britain, such as an EU-wide agreement on Brits using e-gates on the continent.
“Instead, it sounds like we’re giving away our fishing quotas, becoming a rule-taker from Brussels once again and getting free movement by the back door. This isn’t a reset, it’s a surrender.”
Roman Lavrynovych appeared at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Friday and was remanded in custody.
Officers from the Metropolitan Police’s Counter Terrorism Command led the investigation because of the connections to the prime minister.
Emergency services were called to a fire in the early hours of Monday at a house in Kentish Town, north London, where Sir Keir lived with his family before the election.