Mar 25, 2021

  • Mark OgdenSenior Writer, ESPN FC

The race to the 2022 World Cup in Qatar has now begun with the qualification entrada underway across the globe. Side by side Th, Apr i, marks the 600-twenty-four hours countdown to the start of tournament on November. 21, 2022, and the menstruum in betwixt promises to be hectic and congested for many of the world'southward top players.

While the touch on of the coronavirus pandemic has placed unprecedented demands on players due to the congested nature of this season, the workload is only probable to intensify in the weeks and months until the beginning of Qatar 2022.

- UEFA WC qualifiers on ESPN+: Stream Live games, replays (U.S)
- How 2022 Globe Cup qualifying works around the globe

The major leagues, national associations and continental confederations have yet to agree on a calendar that will enable the 2022-23 gild season to incorporate a six-calendar week suspension for the World Cup to take place, while the knock-on effect of the pandemic has created uncertainty over the prospect of clubs embarking on lucrative preseason tours in the summertime of 2022. But, however the key bug are resolved, the men in the middle will be the star players who are expected to perform in domestic leagues and cups, European competitions and international fixtures.

One thing for certain is that the 2022 Globe Loving cup, because of its November-Dec schedule, will take a huge touch on football game in the years ahead. So what tin players and fans expect?

Why is Qatar 2022 having such an impact on the calendar?

When Qatar was announced as the winning bid to host the 2022 Globe Loving cup back in 2010, it was awarded on the footing of the tournament being staged in June and July, as with every previous tournament. Merely concerns over the searing summer temperatures in the Middle East, which boilerplate 41.2 degrees Celsius (106.2 Fahrenheit) in June, prompted FIFA to move the World Loving cup to November-December.

That determination immediately created a major problem for the club game, peculiarly in Europe, with the season traditionally played from August to May. The concluding two months of the year are a busy time with plenty of domestic games and group fixtures in the Champions League and Europa League.

With Qatar 2022 running from November. 21 to Dec. 18, 2022, the club game faces a shutdown of at least six weeks -- a week earlier the tournament for preparation and a week afterward for players to recover -- so the 2022-23 flavor must somehow be reconfigured to enable the club game and the World Cup to be ended as smoothly as possible. Only the ripple outcome of dropping a World Loving cup into the middle of a club season will touch both the start and stop engagement of the 2022-23 season and potentially the offset of the 2023-24 campaign.

What will a role player'southward workload expect like between at present and the Globe Cup?

Players have unlike demands in different leagues, but the top stars tin can look to play between 55-sixty games a season if their club is successful. And then y'all take international fixtures. In 2019-xx, according to Transfermarkt, Manchester United captain Harry Maguire played more than minutes than any other player in the earth, clocking upward v,509 minutes in 61 games for club and state concluding season. FC Copenhagen defender Victor Nelsson came second, with 5,366 minutes.

United reached the semifinals in iii competitions final season, which helped Maguire brand so many appearances, but with the likes of Manchester Urban center and Bayern Munich also regularly going deep in all competitions, top players could play more than 100 games each for society and country betwixt now and the offset of the World Loving cup. But they will then accept to play in the tournament -- the pinnacle of many players' career -- and return for the second one-half of the 2022-23 season. And if y'all play for a team like Bayern, United or City, players tin await to travel to Asia or North America in summer 2022 on a preseason tour, which will only add to their game time.

And then what are the solutions?

If at that place are solutions out there, the rival factions -- FIFA, clubs, national associations, continental confederations -- are yet to agree on them.

One obvious answer would be to but outset the 2022-23 club flavor at the offset of August and extend it until early June, giving clubs additional time to play their fixtures and overcome the impact of a iv-half-dozen week interruption in November and December.

But UEFA has already scheduled the 2023 Champions League final for May 27 in Munich, one day earlier than the engagement for the 2022 terminal in Saint Petersburg, and then there is little sign of UEFA extending their season to permit for the disruption caused by the Earth Cup. UEFA will too lose two Champions League/Europa League lucifer days to the Earth Cup, so when will they exist staged? We are still awaiting an answer.

And in terms of national leagues, sources have told ESPN that discussions are however ongoing in terms of a commencement date and end date, simply while information technology seems straightforward to cram in the European fixtures over a shorter period of time as has been done this flavor, it would not solve the problem of finding space for 4-6 weeks of league games that would need to be moved for the World Loving cup

Has the pandemic added to the problem?

Aye. The CONMEBOL Globe Loving cup qualifiers in S America began last October, but a full circular of qualifiers has been postponed this calendar month due to travel restrictions forcing Europe-based players to stay with their clubs. Those fixtures are likely to exist played side by side flavour, with the delayed Copa America expected to take identify this summertime, a year afterward beingness postponed because of the pandemic.

- Vickery: CONMEBOL's bizarre conclusion to press on with full Copa

In Europe, Euro 2020 is also due to go ahead this June and July, so what was due to be a free summer for players will now be busy with 2 major tournaments, plus the delayed Olympics in Tokyo, which will involve major nations such as Germany, France, Spain, Argentine republic and Brazil. The pandemic, and delay in staging the Euros, Copa and Olympics, has hit the revenue streams of height clubs, who will miss out on a money-spinning summer tours for the second successive year, making it a financial necessity to cash in next summer.

So the bear on on the 2021-22 season is still unknown, but whatsoever rollover from this campaign will inevitably add together to the congestion and demands of next year.

What do the clubs think?

Sources at a number of high-contour clubs accept told ESPN that the scheduling of the 2022 World Loving cup is unhelpful and an inconvenience, but something that they have no choice but to have. However, sources have also said that clubs will concord onto players until the latest possible divergence date for Qatar, potentially using them for league fixtures only a calendar week before the World Loving cup begins. Similarly, players could notice themselves dorsum in society activeness just days after the Globe Cup ends, which could be challenging for players who reach the semifinals and terminal.

International coaches often have the benefit of a lengthy build-up to a major tournament, with training camps and friendly games scheduled for grooming, but that is unlikely to happen in 2022. Expect clubs to insist that the World Cup fits in around their demands rather than the other style around.

The European Club Clan (ECA), which includes Bayern Munich, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Manchester United, Liverpool and other major teams, initially urged FIFA to phase the tournament in April-May 2022 before the decision was made to move to November-December. Having lost that boxing, the clubs and UEFA blocked FIFA president Gianni Infantino's attempts to enlarge Qatar 2022 to 48 teams from 32, in order to avoid further games for their players.

Volition football prefer Arsene Wenger's plan for a unified calendar?

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Wenger: Winter World Cup makes sense

Arsenal director Arsene Wenger said it makes sense to concord the 2022 Qatar World Cup in the winter months, merely admitted it volition have an impact on European league schedules.

Arsene Wenger, the one-time Arsenal manager, is now FIFA'due south chief of global development and he recently proposed an overhaul of the football calendar that would see a unified season from March to Nov.

"I'one thousand convinced that to harmonise the earth calendar, somebody has to give in and information technology'southward Europe or the rest of the earth," Wenger said. "It would make things more simple."

In an platonic globe, the simplicity of Wenger'south program would solve the trouble, but arguably the biggest reason for moving Qatar 2022 to Nov-December was the summer climate and the same would apply to many leagues in Europe, with the heat in likes of Spain, France, Hellenic republic and Russian federation making it unfeasible to play club games. Information technology would exist a similar trouble in large parts of Africa and Asia.

The plan would besides see teams in the southern hemisphere having to play through harsh winter conditions, and so the proposal falls down on the issue of climate. So shifting the football flavour from March to November would not solve the Qatar 2022 trouble, fifty-fifty if it could be imposed in such a short space of fourth dimension.

Is anyone thinking about the demands on the players?

Leading players are becoming increasingly vocal on a range of bug, only and so far, there accept been no concerns raised almost the workload between now and Qatar 2022. Players tend to want to play, but coaches are often the ones to speak up virtually the demands existence placed on their squad.

Before this season, England managing director Gareth Southgate said that the issue over the football calendar effectually Qatar had not been addressed, simply he called on coaches to be given an input.

"I would hope that within all the discussions that coaches are consulted," Southgate said. "It doesn't have to be me, but peradventure coaches of the big clubs, maybe all the national managers, whatever it might be. Only generally speaking, a lot of the decisions are fabricated without the input of coaches."

Then when will we accept a confirmed route map for football into Qatar 2022?

That continues to exist an unanswered question. The challenge of dealing with the COVID-nineteen pandemic has understandably taken the focus away from the need to program the calendar alee of Qatar 2022, but sources take said that a resolution is unlikely until after this yr, well into the 2021-22 flavour.

Only it'southward safe to say that the next two years volition be busier than ever for the world's top footballers.

Qatar has been a controversial choice of host from the outset, so what volition it be similar in 2022?

FIFA has changed the selection procedure for Earth Cups since 2010, when the hosts of the 2018 and 2022 Globe Cups were decided, with the voting of Russia and Qatar'due south successful bids both mired in allegations of corruption. Now, every football nation gets to vote on the potential host for future tournaments rather than 22 FIFA Executive Committee members.

But bated from the controversy over the tournament being moved from its usual June-July slot in the calendar, Qatar has also been nether the microscope for the handling of migrant workers who have helped build many of the new stadia in the state since 2010. According to a report in the Guardian last month, more than 6,500 migrant workers accept died in Qatar during that time.

Responding to the Guardian study, Qatar'southward government said a "very small percentage" of over 1.four million expatriates in the state had died between 2011 and 2019.

The government's argument said it had taken steps to better health and condom of workers in the terminal ii decades and had imposed punishments on business owners who violated safety standards.

Homosexuality is an illegal offence in Qatar that can carry a prison judgement, and there has been widespread condemnation of the Gulf state's human rights tape, with Norway's players wearing T-shirts begetting the slogan "Human being rights on and off the pitch" prior to Wednesday's Earth Loving cup qualifier against Gibraltar.

When asked nearly Qatar'southward position on homosexuality by ESPN in 2019, Hassan al Thawadi, the secretary general of the Supreme Commission for Delivery and Legacy for Qatar 2022, said: "We are a bourgeois people and we enquire visitors to appreciate our culture while at the same time accepting our hospitality. Open displays of affection are not part of our culture and we enquire that people don't [openly display affection]."

The international scrutiny of Qatar will only increase as the tournament approaches, and is likely to overshadow the host nation during the event itself similar no other World Cup before it.