MARTIN KEOWN: I feel for the players this weekend, but it’s hard to tiptoe through a game

It’s like the nursery rhyme “10 green bottles hanging on the wall” as we enter the last weekend of the Premier League before the World Cup. It feels like we’re waiting to see which player is next.

We hope, of course, that no one does. But it’s an occupational hazard for any professional soccer player that you end up getting injured. You just don’t want that now, on the eve of this tournament.

Days ago we learned that the forever-fit Sadio Mane from Senegal has an injury that could affect his World Cup. France lost to N’Golo Kante and Paul Pogba, Portugal lost to Diogo Jota and Pedro Neto and England lost to Ben Chilwell.

The news of Mane will resonate with all the players chosen to represent their country. They wouldn’t be human if they didn’t go into this final round of Premier League matches and think about the consequences for themselves. One mistake – one adjustment, one tear, one harmless challenge – and your World Cup chance could be gone forever.

I still regret missing the 1994 European Cup Winners Cup final for Arsenal, as I was injured the week before in what, looking back, was a pretty insignificant Premier League game against QPR, because we sat in the middle of the table.

I now know that I should have managed my energy level better. But it’s impossible to tiptoe through a game if it’s in your DNA to give 100 percent.

That is the predicament many players find themselves in right now. It’s a difficult balancing act to manage. Arsenal played nine games in October – only in September 1969 (11) and April 1980 (10) they played more games in a calendar month.

This is the most intense schedule these players have ever experienced in their careers. Of course, not all of our Premier League stars go to the World Cup. Erling Haaland, Manchester City’s 23-goal revelation, gets a nice break on the beach, which Pep Guardiola will enjoy. But Tottenham’s Harry Kane will lead the line for England in every game at this World Cup, which will concern his manager Antonio Conte.

Gareth Southgate was the one who was concerned about the condition of his England players, but that concern is now passed on to club managers, who will wait and see when and in what condition their players will return for the restart of the league on Boxing Day.

It has been an unprecedented campaign. This Premier League season started just a week earlier than the last and is expected to end a week later. Yet somehow we squeeze four weeks of World Cup football into the middle of this crazy schedule. So much is being asked of the players – it’s exhausting.

The league season started the first month with one game a week, but after that the players had a crazy playing period.

However, they have still given us an exciting season so far. The battle for a place in the Champions League has never been more open with Chelsea and Liverpool outside the top four, along with Manchester United and Newcastle’s transformation, making it all the more exciting.

In the bottom half, just six points separate Brentford on 11th and Nottingham Forest on 20th, making it a mystery to anyone who will be relegated.

It will be fascinating to see how teams go about starting from scratch on Boxing Day, but how much the players have left in their tanks remains to be seen.

It may ultimately be the survival of the fittest, rather than who is the best.

What is compelling for the World Cup is how the players will already be at the boiling point. They should be at their peak level of fitness.

But they still have a weekend of Premier League action to negotiate before the inaugural winter championship kicks off in Qatar.