OPINION How preseason camp may penalise Juve; boost Inter and Napoli
With the modern era heralding the arrival of marketing and sponsorship obligations – and with more and more teams are going on long summer tours overseas to boost their fan base and revenue, one has to ask if all these summer commitments are ultimately counterproductive to the campaign as a whole.
Cracks and imbalances don’t take long to emerge. I wonder if there is a link between a team’s obligations (let’s say the Supercup) and its injuries, not to mention a bad start to the season. Take Juventus, for example, who had to play in Beijing and were thus unable to prepare themselves calmly in the mountains as they otherwise would have, and haven’t exactly shined since the beginning of the campaign. It's tempting to say that having to train in a scorching-hot Vinovo had something to do with that.
For the flipside, take Napoli, who were able to spend the whole summer in Dimaro, at high altitude, and who focussed on conditioning rather than friendlies. An old-school regime, with only two trips overseas to see how the players were working on their fitness. Now, the Partenopei are Italy’s form team: they run like mad and obtain results.
These are- it must be repeated – simple deductions that aren’t backed up by peer-reviewed research, but can find corroboration within the world of statistics.
And there are a number of factors that we haven’t taken into consideration, whether it’s Vinovo’s pitches or even psychology, as a player’s emotional state and motivation can affect his exposure to muscular problems.
One has also to also take national footballing culture into consideration, which explains why everyone in Italy prefers gym work, an experience that doesn’t match the kind of weights you would truly be dealing with on the pitch.
There are obvious consequences with regards to how a team plays (muscular teams are stronger but run less well, whilst technical teams are more dynamic but less tough) and how it handles injuries, as clubs need to make sure that their players are growing muscles within a predetermined time frame and as part of a coordinated plan.
Another unquantifiable factor is, of course, each player’s relationship with his national team, how often he is called up, and obviously whether its training methods differ…
To sum up, it’s hard to avoid recent trends within the league and ignore the correlation with how well or badly certain clubs organised their summer workouts. The teams that have been able to prepare themselves in a regular manner and in the right environment (Napoli, Fiorentina and even Inter) are in better shape. The Juventus team that trained in Vinovo, not to mention Milan, are definitely struggling more.
Without weighing in on each club’s decision-making process, not to mention the relationship between club and coach or indeed Paulo Dybala’s thigh, these observations are worth reflecting on. Football is a simple game. Until the next round of games, that is.
