2015 ISAKOS Biennial Congress ePoster #2604

Use of Basic Screening Tools to Guide Warm-Up Exercises in Tournament Football to Decrease the Incidence of Injury; the Experiences of The English Football Association at the FIFA Under 20 World Cup

Neil Jain, BM, MRCS(Ed), FRCS(Tr&Orth), Manchester UNITED KINGDOM
Steve Kemp, MSc, BSc (hons) PG Dip (manips), GSR, MCSP, MMACP, Wolverhampton UNITED KINGDOM
Mario Bizzini, PhD, PT, Zurich, CH SWITZERLAND
Gary Lewin, BSc (hons) Dip Phys, MCSP, SRP, London UNITED KINGDOM
Ian Beasley, MBBS MRCGP Dip Sports Med FFSEM, London UNITED KINGDOM

The Football Association, Wembley Stadium, London, UNITED KINGDOM

FDA Status Not Applicable

Summary: The use of simple screening tests assessing player recovery to guide the use of injury prevention treatments during international tournament football play appears to decrease in incidence of injury and provide a resultant increase in player availability for selection for matches and we therefore recommend its use.

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Abstract:

Introduction

Understanding injury is paramount to the preparation of any football team, in part to distribute adequate resources to provide rehabilitation. Minimal evidence exists within the literature regarding the number and severity of injuries a national team should expect to experience when participating in an international tournament. It is beneficial for a team to keep the injury rate as low as possible in order to maximise the selection options for the team manager. We therefore introduced a series of screening tools in order to determine the level of recovery for the player and use them to guide the number of injury prevention treatments for each player during a recent international FIFA approved tournament.

Methods

Data was recorded for all players within the England National Football team squad for the FIFA under 20 World Cup tournament held in Turkey in 2013. A screening tool was introduced which involved a combination of a health and wellness questionnaire, urine osmolality, physical tests to identify both anterior and posterior chain tightness and a further test which assessed both muscle fatigue and reaction. The medical staff reviewed the data and assessed the level of recovery for each player. As a result of their findings, a number of injury prevention treatments were introduced such as massage, physiotherapy and a modification in the amount that a player would train physically that day. All injuries were recorded and an injury was defined as being one that excluded a player from a training session or match. The rate of injuries was then compared with data provided by FIFA describing the number of injuries at this under 20 World Cup along with previous tournaments.

Results

Twenty-one players formed the squad and they were assessed for a period of 23 days as part of the pre-tournament camp and the duration that the team were involved in the tournament. During the tournament one injury was observed within the squad, a grade I calf strain, and the player was unavailable for a single game. This provided an equivalent value to 0.33 injuries per match or 20.2 injuries per 1000 match hours, calculated as 3.95 injuries per 1000 player days.

When compared with the data from FIFA regarding injury rate at the tournament, the mean number of injuries per match was 3 (CI 2.8 – 3.2), which may be equated to 1.5 injuries per team per match. This is higher than the 0.33 injuries per match seen from our team. The injury we observed was a time-loss injury, which equated to 20.2 injuries per 1000 playing hours. This was noticeably less than the mean from the previous tournaments that was 32.8 per 1000 player hours (range 21.5 to 36.1).

Conclusions

The use of simple screening tests assessing player recovery to guide the use of injury prevention treatments during international tournament football play appears to decrease in incidence of injury and provide a resultant increase in player availability for selection for matches. We would recommend using it as a guide, although it is labour intensive.