Professional football players battled fatigue for six weeks after COVID infection, research shows
Professional footballers’ matchday performance fell after recovering from COVID-19, with three-quarters battling fatigue for six weeks, a University of Essex study has found.
The study – published in Physiological reports — examined top football players for the first time and examined the impact of the long Covid-19 crisis on top athletes.
The study found that 77 percent of those studied battled general fatigue for 37 days and 54 percent battled muscle fatigue for 38 days after the test came back negative.
GPS data from ten matches after returning to play revealed a four percent drop in match performance, despite no reduction in lung capacity.
The research was led by Dr. Michele Girardi, who worked with the university’s School of Sport, Rehabilitation, and Exercise Sciences.
He hopes the research will help improve return-to-play protocols for sports stars recovering from the virus.
Dr. Girardi said: “This is one of the first studies to look at the impact of COVID-19 on professional footballers.
“An original aspect is that we studied the metabolic power of players during official matches after the infection.
“We were surprised to see such an impact on players’ ability to train at high intensity.
“The study results suggest that fatigue symptoms should be carefully considered for a safe and effective return to sport post-COVID.
“We were limited in who we could study, but the findings are cause for concern and show that more needs to be done to help players return to the sport.
“This research also has wider implications as footballers have been in a unique position during the ongoing pandemic and have almost been canaries in the coal mine.
“The football world was very unusual because when we all had to isolate ourselves from everyone, they continued to train, meet in groups and play.
“Much is still being learned about the impact of COVID-19 and we hope this research will help clubs support players’ return to play and help inform public health policy on long COVID-19.”
Dr. Girardi collaborated with colleagues in Italy to study players in the Italian Serie C league for the article entitled ‘COVID-19 illness in professional football players: symptoms and impact on lung function and metabolic power during matches’.
One anonymous club opened its doors to a team of researchers, including academics from the University of Padua, the University of Rome “Foro Italico”, the University of Verona and University College London.
Data from 13 players infected with COVID was studied over the course of about six months.
They had an average age of 24 years, were just under 6 feet tall and weighed about 12 stone.
It is now hoped that the research will be expanded with more teams taking part to understand the impact of the coronavirus.
Dr. Girardi added: “Although this is a relatively small sample size, this is crucial data that shows more needs to be done to understand the impact of COVID on young, healthy people.
“The virus has not disappeared and sports teams are high-risk environments that can act as real vectors for infections.”
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