Present at a press conference on the eve of the France team’s match against the Netherlands, as part of the Euro 2024 qualifiers, the midfielder questioned the overloaded competition schedules.
Aurélien Tchouameni may only be 23 years old, but he is a player whose words are listened to. Holder of the French team (27 caps, 3 goals) and midfielder for Real Madrid, it was he who presented himself at a press conference on Thursday October 12, on the eve of the Blues’ match in the Netherlands. During his appearance in front of journalists, Tchouameni took the opportunity to rant about a subject that regularly comes up in discussions: the accumulation of matches.
“Obviously we play too many matches. (…) Today, it’s rare to have just one match per week. Organisms are put to the test. It’s up to the authorities to do something and at some point, it will be up to us, the players, to bang our fists on the table. (…) For a player to play 80 or 90 matches is not possible“, assured the French midfielder. Extremely stressed, the players inevitably end up injured.
Van Dijk makes the same observation
For Friday’s match, the Netherlands must do without a dozen players on the flank, when the France team experienced numerous physical problems in the defensive sector with the successive withdrawals of Dayot Upamecano, William Saliba, Jules Koundé or even Axel Disasi. “We must respect the players, but we are not asked for our opinion“, lamented Tchouameni, who specified that “banging your fist on the table means coming together to make yourself heard if we all agree“.
Earlier today, Virgil van Dijk, captain of the Dutch team, shared the same opinion: “We play more and more matches. We, the players, should start saying something about this, think about a solution.” At the beginning of August, it was Raphaël Varane, the Manchester United defender who recently retired from international duty, who published a message on his social networks to share the concerns of football players and call for a reaction from them .
“It always goes in the same direction”
While the new formats of the Champions League and the Club World Cup, which will come into force respectively next year and in two years, will add new dates to the calendars of clubs and players, these warnings multiply. It remains to be seen how much room for maneuver the players have vis-à-vis the institutions which are in charge of the competitions. “Will they (the players) have the opportunity to calm down this pace? That’s all I wish for them“, reacted Didier Deschamps.
The coach appeared somewhat pessimistic on the issue: “This problem does not date from today but it still goes in the same direction”. Before a possible concerted action between players of the France team to defend their physical integrity, the 23 Blues trained on the pitch of the Johan Cruyff Arena, whose roof was closed due to the rain, with a priority objective in head: obtain qualification for the Euro by winning against the Netherlands on Friday evening.