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Hello! Are football’s superstars about to down tools? Could the game really go on strike?
Coming up:
😡 Players rage over fixture pile-up
⭐ Endrick’s European record
🕰️ Guardiola’s 3,000 days at City
🏀 Chelsea secure big NBA hire
Strike a balance? Rodri says players ‘close’ to taking action over packed schedule
In six weeks, Rodri stands to collect the Ballon d’Or. At worst, he’ll lose the vote by a whisker. It doesn’t take the trophy to categorise him as the world’s best footballer, or as near as damn it.
When he speaks, the game is going to listen, and it was listening yesterday when the Spaniard said that a swollen calendar — packed to the rafters now the Champions League has expanded and FIFA’s much larger Club World Cup is growing legs — could prompt players to go on strike.
An idle threat? Maybe. But the Manchester City midfielder didn’t sound like he was bluffing, and his willingness to speak his mind publicly was telling in itself. The risk of burnout is a hot topic. Players such as Rodri — and Liverpool’s Alisson — are speaking for their colleagues. To half-quote Reservoir Dogs’ Mister Blonde, the doggy isn’t going to bark all day.
Here’s what Rodri had to say before City’s Champions League opener against Inter Milan tonight. He was asked specifically if strike action was being considered. “Yes, I think we are close to that,” he said. “If it keeps this way, we will have no other option.”
Not long ago, a tweet from Rodri’s City team-mate, Ruben Dias, cut to the heart of a farcical schedule. It’s rammed. And it’s an active dispute.
How did it come to this?
FIFA is already facing legal action over a stacked fixture list from FIFPro (the worldwide footballers’ union), Spain’s La Liga and a group representing other European Leagues, including the Premier League.
The complainants say FIFA has driven the calendar “beyond saturation”, risking player welfare. FIFPro estimates the 2024-25 season will be the worst yet for workloads. Part of the beef is FIFA’s restyled Club World Cup, due to take place in the United States next summer.
FIFA claims the moaning constitutes hypocrisy and self-interest. Tottenham Hotspur and Newcastle United staging a friendly in Australia back in May a few days after the end of the Premier League season does not prove them wrong. A strike would be unprecedented, and a major undertaking. In theory, the Professional Footballers’ Association — the players’ union in the English game — would need a majority vote from its 5,000 members.
Even so, when one of the best players in the world talks about manning the picket line, it would not be a bad idea for FIFA to take heed. Or to assume the nuclear option is possible.
News Round-Up
Courtesy of Minnesota Timberwolves
Champions League: Liverpool show class; were you watching, Poch?
🔴 Liverpool and Arne Slot passed a test. One-nil down after a few minutes at AC Milan, on the back of a first Premier League defeat on Saturday, was not ideal. They knuckled down, they turned the game — with a helping hand from their set-piece specialists — and gave Milan an old-fashioned chasing. I’d say the players trust Slot’s process.
🇺🇸 Hopefully Mauricio Pochettino had the TV on. Christian Pulisic notched a sweet finish for Milan and Weston McKennie’s refusal to roll over at Juventus continued with a goal in their 3-1 victory against PSV Eindhoven. The USMNT scene will welcome some smiles.
🔁 Aston Villa’s European pedigree is intact. We should have predicted as much after their Europa Conference League semi-finals run last season, but still. They had efforts disallowed in their victory at Switzerland’s Young Boys. In a stadium with a shopping mall built into it and a plastic pitch, they put their opponents away regardless. Good signs.
🙌 Who will go big on Viktor Gyokeres? Seriously, his goalscoring is blistering. He’s got 12 this season in seven appearances (Erling Haaland levels) and pinged in a beauty for Sporting Lisbon against Lille — albeit, a beauty overshadowed by Zeno Debast’s stone-cold stunner (above). Gyokeres has to be on various club radars.
🇪🇸 Kylian Mbappe bagged for Real Madrid (that’s a line saved in my drafts). The competition’s reigning champions made hard work of dispatching Stuttgart but a win’s a win, and Endrick surpassed Raul by becoming their youngest Champions League scorer.
🖊️ Harry Kane, meanwhile, hit four for Bayern Munich during a total annihilation of Dinamo Zagreb. Bypass the fact that three of those were penalties, but absolutely do not bypass Jamal Musiala’s assist for Raphael Guerreiro’s sumptuous half-volley (below).
📲 Champions League LIVE updates.
Pep’s power
Pep 3000 sounds like either an Outkast tribute act or a product from a certain episode of South Park (look it up, for old time’s sake.) It’s actually a Premier League landmark, with Senor Guardiola hitting 3,000 days in charge of Manchester City today.
He’s had 63 defeats in that time. Sixty-three in just over eight years! It’s been his era in the Premier League and it’ll be remembered as such — unless City fail in their ongoing set-to with the governing body.
Arsenal = Mourinho’s Chelsea?
Without wanting to rub it in on Spurs, the influence of Arsenal set-piece coach Nicolas Jover bears repeating. Gabriel’s header against Tottenham on Sunday was the 19th time on Jover’s watch when they opened the scoring in a game from a dead-ball scenario. Bonanza.
But we shouldn’t overlook the other end of the field either. Arsenal remain unbeaten away from home in 2024. They’ve conceded three goals in those games. As Art de Roche points out, that’s Chelsea 2005 levels — the year when, with Jose Mourinho in his pomp, Chelsea didn’t lose a single away league fixture.
Set pieces will win Mikel Arteta matches. That much we know. But like Chelsea, it’s that defence which will do it if Arsenal win the title.
Around The Athletic FC
Catch a match
Champions League: Celtic vs Slovan Bratislava, 3pm ET/8pm BST, Paramount+/TNT Sports; Club Bruges vs Borussia Dortmund, 3pm/8pm, Paramount+, CBS, Fubo/TNT Sports; Manchester City vs Inter Milan, 3pm/8pm, Paramount+, Fubo/TNT Sports; Paris Saint-Germain vs Girona, 3pm/8pm, Paramount+/TNT Sports.
Carabao Cup: Brighton vs Wolverhampton Wanderers, 2.45pm/7.45pm, CBS, Paramount+, Amazon Prime/Sky Sports; Coventry City vs Tottenham Hotspur, 3pm/8pm, Paramount+/Sky Sports.
MLS: Atlanta United vs Inter Miami, 7.30pm/12.30am, MLS Season Pass/Apple TV; Portland Timbers vs LA Galaxy, 10.30pm/3.30am, MLS Season Pass/Apple TV; LAFC vs Austin FC, 10.30pm/3.30am, MLS Season Pass, Fox Sports 1/Apple TV.
(Top photo: Gualter Fatia/Getty Images)
