What do the top football players do when the football season is over?

Most professional players rarely get anything longer than 4 weeks off post season. Some may only get as little as 1 week, depending on their situation.

 But, what exactly would their schedule look like before they do go back to pre-season with their club?

Physically Recover

All players will take some time to recover and regenerate their bodies from the long season.

 Top level players can play 60-70 games in a 9 or 10 month period.

 Add on top of that training sessions and long journeys away from home for domestic, European and international matches then you can see how it can take its toll on your body.

 As you can imagine, the players who have started most of the season are actually at a point where their fitness levels have decreased, purely due to wear and tear.

Players are usually then given a mandatory 1-4 week period completely away from football. This is usually when you’ll see photos of players in the media on the beach with family and friends.

Players going to international tournaments over the off-season have a tougher time as their time off is of a much shorter duration. Especially if they make it to the Champions League Final.

 Last season the national team players from Liverpool and Real Madrid had to go from the pinnacle of club football to the pinnacle of international football in a very short space of time – and be expected to perform at their best.

 Compare their rest to a team who may have exited the Champions League stages earlier like Barcelona or Manchester United (or players who didn’t make it), they would have slightly longer time to recover before joining up with their international team mates.

Psychologically Recover

This goes hand and hand with the first point. However, it is often overlooked.
Looking at the top professionals, you often hear comments at how easy their life is because they play football for a living and get to earn a huge salary in the meantime.

It often gets forgotten that there is added pressure that comes with those salaries. Between expectations of fans, media manager, team mates and of course pressure they put on themselves to succeed, there is a lot of mental stress. 

Think of the drain they experience mentally: psyching yourself up pre-match to prepare or dealing with nerves when playing at the highest levels, the high’s and low’s of the season results, wins or even mistakes, the consistency required to eat, train, recover and perform like an elite athlete every day and once again the travel these players do.

This is happening every day for 11 months. Your every-day worker will complain about needing a holiday after 2 months in an office.

Whether you want to believe it or not, players at elite levels have to deal with HUGE mental costs.

Imagine Loris Karius after the Champions League Final. The backlash from media and fans and the scrutiny you’d put yourself under. Very tough to deal with and who knows how he would have performed if there was another match a few days later, which often happens after a European game.

Finally, a lot of players have to try get this recovery in whilst being in the midst of transfer speculation, medicals and travel to get a new club sorted.

Granted, they are paid these huge sums to train their body and mind to be able to cope with these things. However they are still only human, and appreciation is there for the 11 month drain they have on their minds. So, of course, recovery is needed!

Recovery usually includes getting away from the game completely, not even talking about it! Less restrictions on themselves with nutrition, training, holidays overseas, doing some things and spending time with people they enjoy are the most common things to do.

General Fitness

Although most of this article has been about recovering, top players will rarely take their eye off the ball.
Head of Performance at Arsenal recently spoke on a podcast about players immediately wanting training programs for off-season to ensure they were good to go for pre-season.

Obviously, this is what every coach and probably fan wants to hear. Fortunately with Top players comes top sports science teams and S&C coaches to provide training programs which are not going to take away from recovery, but instead boost it whilst still building and maintaining fitness. 

If you try and go off and focus on more intense football specific work you are no doubt just delaying the recovery process. Leave pre-season for the specific stuff. Get your general fitness up to scratch in the off-season.

Most players will initially stay away from running to start with and stick to low impact activities like cycling, elliptical machines, other sports such as tennis or swimming. 

Additionally many players will use this time to get rid of any niggling injuries and imbalances via some strength work.

A lot of players will focus more on general gym work during this time to strengthen the body for the heavy impact of pre-season.

For those with a longer off-season they will begin to introduce low volumes of running to gradually prepare the body for what’s ahead. More often than not top players will arrive for pre-season in pretty good shape.

It’s a tricky situation as players find themselves wanting to completely relax but also being maybe a little concerned of letting go too much as they will have to work to get back where they should be come pre-season.

This is why most players will take 1-2 week complete break of even thinking about training or nutrition before using the remainder of off-season to build up training volume and get back into some good habits as they feel more physically and mentally refreshed.

One thing is for sure, top players no longer see pre-season as a time to wait for to get fit, they rarely allow themselves to drop to really low levels which perhaps happened in the past. 

After their brief off-season rest they can get back to a high level of general fitness fairly quickly before getting their needed top up of the specific work in pre-season on the pitch.

What It May Look Like

WEEK 1-2

Holiday – Physical and Mental Break. Plenty of sleep. Low-impact exercise in gym or off-feet

WEEK 2-4

General Fitness – Gradual increase training volume 2-3x per week to 3-4x per week.

Strength/Rehab/Imbalances plus low volume running exposure
Good nutritional habits back into their routine.

If you are a reader playing Semi-Pro in Sydney, chances are you have a much larger window in the off-season. So after your 2-4 week break you have a great chance to work on and build your general fitness that the top level pro’s can only wish they had!!

This is your chance to get a little closer to their physical attributes, as it’s not possible when the hectic season comes around!

Check out our 10 week off-season training HERE at KIKOFF Conditioning. Limited spaces remaining!