A new FIFPro study reveals the grueling travel schedules faced by top female footballers, particularly Australian Matildas, emphasizing the significant physical and mental strain they endure.
Six Matildas stars travelled so far last season they could have circumnavigated the planet three times each, according to a new study into the increasing workload of top women’s footballers by FIFPro, the global players’ union.
The study looks at what FIFPro describes as an imbalance in the development of the women’s game, with a small number of elite players in top competitions being asked to shoulder “excessive pressure” by playing more and more matches, while the majority play considerably less. It includes a list of the top 10 players ranked by international travel load in the 2023-24 season, six of whom are Australian: Hayley Raso (1st), Ellie Carpenter (2nd), Caitlin Foord (3rd), Kyra Cooney-Cross (5th), Steph Catley (6th) and Teagan Micah (7th). All six of those players spent at least seven days – 2 per cent of their season – on flights between Europe and Australia, racking up a total distance of at least 130,000 kilometres. While this is an obvious consequence of Australia’s geographic isolation from Europe, where most of the Matildas’ biggest stars play their club football, the numbers highlight the significant physical and mental strain they are being placed under. FIFPro’s research doesn’t include domestic travel, or trips taken while on tour with a club or national team, which would extend those distances even further. Carpenter was one of four players selected for an in-depth analysis of the workloads they were asked to carry for club and country between the start of the 2023-24 campaign and the end of the Olympic Games in Paris. The 24-year-old, who plays her club football for French club Olympique Lyonnais, played 3849 minutes in all competitions last season, a personal record. Her busiest period was between January and March 2024, when she was free of Matildas-related commitments but played six club matches in each month – four of which were played ‘back to back’, meaning a gap of five days or fewer between games
Matildas Fifpro Women's Football Player Workload Travel Demands
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