AC Milan have struggled with many injuries at the start of this season and the alarm has certainly been sounded. Giorgio Furlani will meet with Stefano Pioli next week to discuss the solution, which could be NFL-inspired.
Yesterday’s clash against Lecce added two injuries to the list and Milan now find themselves in a crisis. In that sense, the international break has come at a good time and it will be used to properly analyse the struggles.
As highlighted by Calciomercato.com, citing an NFL study, muscle injuries are an increased risk especially when the players carry out high-intensity sprints (80-100%). It’s exactly that, in fact, which led to Rafael Leao’s hamstring injury against Lecce on Saturday.
So, what can be done about the issue? Pioli will have to sit down with his entire staff to discuss possible solutions. Not just with the medical section, but also those focused on tactics. Investments will likely be needed for equipment to better understand when the players need to rest or carry out light training.
Furthermore, Pioli is known for his pressing-oriented system and he might have to tweak some of the mechanisms. There are ways for the players to move better on the pitch, such as knowing when to hand over responsibility to a teammate.
Then, of course, it goes without saying that rotation is necessary to avoid overworking the players. That’s why squad depth is an essential pillar of the solution. How the latter will look exactly remains to be seen, but Milan have to take action after the recent struggles.
A meeting between Pioli and Furlani has been scheduled, per the report, and the manager will be able to present his findings. Based on that, the CEO will decide what needs to be done on a broader level, above all on the investment front.
Something unrelated, but it looks like Napoli has fired Rudi Garcia. The replacement will most likely be Igor Tudor or Graham Potter.
We’re not Napoli though. That to me doesn’t make much sense. They don’t have the same pressures as Milan
Firing coaches midsession is a quintessential Napoli move. This is ADL’s doing. Milan mustn’t follow suit and carry with Pioli until summer. But his time is surely up then.
We need new direction. 4 years is plenty with the same coach and ideas.
by the summer we will be out of eu cups alotgether. Better to fire now while the season can still be saved
Well NFL and football/soccer are two completely different sports. One is start-stop at frequently high intensity (NFL) kinda like HIIT, while the other is constant running with varying intensity. I didn’t get the context in the article of why injuries occur when intensity is between 80-100% (eg is it if the team utilizes throwing/passing plays more than running plays for instance would probably need the wide receivers running at max intensity for longer. Or is it the case that training regiments that have players running at 80-100). That’s a major context piece.
This doesn’t however explain players getting injured in warm ups. There’s no intensity there. And training is or should be less intense than matches so it doesn’t explain that either.
In football/soccer there are different strategies to intensity so you can be ok control of such variations. So imo it has to be a combo of bodily prep (physios), training methods and overusage. But that’s just a guess
I share your confusion.
Athletes train to the usage. So when a burner like Rafa goes to accelerate it shouldn’t be a problem. He’s done it countless times so clearly he’s not “wound tight” like some speedsters.
Puli pulled up with a hammy after trying to accelerate hard near the end of a very intense game. This looks like classic over use and with a player who is more brittle.
Calabria, not sure but muscle fatigue. RLC, same.
This almost seems like not enough intensity in practice. Adaptation to 100% efforts seem to have fallen off with players who didn’t exhibit such problems in the past.
I wonder if Ibra and Kjaer out mean less intensity in training. Really just a guess, but there is something to “train like you play”.
That said such susceptibility to this sort of injury is also a symptom of over training (on the clinical sense). That would also show in players performing sluggishly physically and mentally.
I also agree with the differences you highlight between football and futball. Entirely different usage patterns and training regimes. I don’t think may soccer stars would make it in the NFL and vis versa. 7 seconds of violence and 45 seconds of standing around is much different than the constant aerobic motion of soccer with the 7 second burst.
Agreed totally. You made some good points especially about training intensity….is it the case indeed that they train less hard and find difficulty in actual games? (Funny enough I recall Cassano being shocked at how intense Pirlo used to train at Milan and it made him realize why Pirlo was one of the best and he was not…while he faked sickness to avoid training when he was at samp and Real lol).
On the flipside there’s over training. Often I see articles about guys coming into the gym on their day offs and I cringe because usually a few weeks later…injuries occur smh🤦♂️. Take the days off to rest
NFL study will help as much as the baseball scouting system money ball or whatever it name was. Enough with this american bs. Focus on football if you want to be successful in football.
Pioli system…? Butcher style….
Why look at NFL study? As someone already stated NFL is high intensity with start/stop and even switching players between plays and football/soccer varies in degrees of intensity and once a player comes off there is no returning to the pitch. NFL player injuries are often different than those experienced by football/soccer players so why bother looking into them?
My answer is Pioli is trying to buy time and hope for wins against Dortmund and Newcastle to save his job. The sad part is that situation is likely and we will finish fourth and push rewind and play same movie next year.
No mention of tom brady? Brady is always making comments on Soccer player injuries, eg pulisic needs to stay limber pliable flexible, more than muscle building. I wonder if SARMs are legal in the EU
The only take away from imitating training methods is that the new methods limit over or to the limit of stretching before any game/competition whether it be soccer, basketball, football or baseball……as when a player over exerts himself, if the the muscle has been earlier stretched to its limit the muscle has no more ability to cushion/travel and tears. Maximum stretching is immediately done after the competition. Being adopted by many of the elite programs for this exact reason.