With the expanded Champions League and planned Club World Cup next year causing a big build-up of fixtures, how likely are we to see players taking action due to the number of games they are forced to play? – Olivier
It’s certainly an issue, and given how many players have spoken publicly about workload, you can bet it’s something they discuss privately. The problem is actually how to organize action. It’s only elite players who play too many games; those lower on the pyramid probably wouldn’t mind playing a few more games for extra money. While many fans are concerned about the proliferation of games that seem to mean very little, they would still be furious if a game they had bought a ticket for and paid travel expenses for was canceled due to an industrial dispute by players who are paid hundreds of thousands of pounds a week earn. That’s one of the reasons why football has gone down a disappointing path; organized opposition is very difficult – the protest against the super league was one of the few occasions where enough different stakeholders in football were aligned enough to backpedal.
That said, the Club World Cup seems like a good target. Due to the messy organization, few fans are likely to have bought tickets and, unlike the Champions League or a World Cup, it is not a competition that players dream of playing in. In terms of the PR war, it would be very easy, at least for players at European clubs, to portray it as an unnecessary addition imposed on the calendar without consultation – because that is true. I don’t expect it, but if there was serious action, it would make sense for players to focus on this during the Club World Cup.
Do you think there is something special about Mauricio Pochettino that makes him suitable as an international coach? –Ray
The truth is, we just don’t know. International management is very different from club management and there are countless examples of great club coaches who have found it difficult to adapt to the more limited player involvement that the international game brings. Likewise, several highly successful national managers – Aimé Jacquet, Lionel Scaloni, Joachim Löw, Luis de la Fuente, Gareth Southgate – have done little at club level but functioned well within the framework of a federation.
The press that is at the heart of Pochettino’s philosophy takes time to impose itself, but some of that at club level has been successful in getting his players into the required fitness. With the USMNT that may not be such a problem; certainly by stereotypes, American players are extremely fit, their shortcomings are tactical and technical. And Pochettino is charismatic; there should be no problem getting buy-in. Pre-World Cup performances for a host can always be a little uneven. In friendlies it’s very difficult to know exactly what the sides are trying to do, but I’d be surprised if the US doesn’t impress at the Gold Cup in 2025.
When did football clubs as such become private ‘companies’? They all started as some kind of community organization or something like that. So how did they end up in the hands of businessmen? – Darragh
They have always been in England, at least since the competition began in 1888. Even when they were founded by churches or teachers’ associations or as factory teams of railway companies. As early as the 1870s, owners of local industries, especially textile mills in the northwest, were luring players from Scotland, ostensibly under the guise of giving them jobs. After 1885, when professionalism was legalized, we no longer had to keep up appearances. SunderlandFor example, the company’s three national titles in the 1890s were based on investments by the shipbuilder Robert Thompson and the mine owner Samuel Tyzack, both of whom were directors. The only difference from a ‘normal’ company was that directors could not make a profit until 1981 and dividends were limited to 7.5%. The first European club to go public was Tottenham in 1983.
Premier League teams have super-talented players who sit or play part of the time. I understand that they have to worry about European matches as well, but essentially stockpiling talented players is not something that can happen in North American leagues, and it seems like an unhealthy formula. Thoughts? –David
Premier League clubs are limited to squads of 25, of which at least eight must be ‘homegrown’ – that is, players who have been associated with an FA-registered club for at least three years before the end of the season in which they turn 21. Players under the age of 21, i.e. for this season players born after January 1, 2003, do not count towards that total. I actually think that’s about right – two players per position with three additional players, plus young players – and the vast majority of players are quick enough to act for a move if they feel they’re not getting enough game time, but considering the match day squads now consist of twenty players, most are involved often enough.
That said, I’m not sure about the situation Chelsea is extremely healthy – they have six players over the age of 21 plus youngsters Carney Chukwuemeka and Deivid Washington who are fit and have not yet started a league match this season, plus eight players who played ten or more league matches last season and who are on loan . That’s a rare case, but other clubs have young talent in stock, and it has certainly been true in the past that there has been a block in the development of talented young players struggling to get pitch time, although that appears to be has declined, partly because players are now more willing to move abroad, and partly because clubs have realized the value of loaning players out to gain experience.
On this day
Floodlit football now feels like the best form of the game, the surroundings fading into darkness as the pitch glows in the center of attention, but only for about half of the sport’s history have matches under lights been allowed. The first attempt at football with lights took place on 14 October 1878 at Bramall Lane, where two representative sides from Sheffield played a match under four lamps of 8,000 candles hung from 30-foot poles. However, the darkness caused an obvious problem: about 6,000 of the remarkable 20,000 spectators were able to sneak in without paying.
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Although further experimentation with floodlights continued, at the inception of the Football League in 1888 it was determined that matches should be played in daylight. In 1920, over 12,000 people came to Deepdale, Preston, to watch a match between the Dick, Kerr Ladies and the rest of England, illuminated by two anti-aircraft searchlights. After watching a floodlit match in Belgium ten years later, Arsenal manager Herbert Chapman had lights installed at Highbury, but it was not until 1951 that the first sanctioned match under lights was played in England, with Arsenal beating Hapoel Tel Aviv 6–1. . After a series of hugely popular friendlies between English sides and top European opposition, the first league match under lights was played in 1956, between Portsmouth and Newcastle, albeit only after it was postponed for several minutes due to technical problems.
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This is an excerpt from Soccer with Jonathan Wilson, the Guardian US’s weekly look at the game in Europe and beyond. Subscribe for free here. Do you have a question for Jonathan? Email footballwithjw@theguardian.com and he will provide the best answer in a future edition