Professional Footballers Australia CEO Brendan Schwab has slammed the tight scheduling of A-League and AFC Champions League games, saying that it's only a matter of time before a player gets seriously injured.
Schwab was announcing the PFA's team of the year in Melbourne on Tuesday, but took a swipe at the scheduling of both FFA and the AFC which he said had players concerned over excessive workload and travel.
He said the current situation, which has seen Melbourne Victory having to mix its A-League final commitments with those it has to the Champions League, which has involved 48 or 72-hour turnaround times between matches, is not sustainable.
"I think it's unacceptable. The fact is that the players have been asked to travel on nine to 15-hour flights and play games with a 48-hour break. It's inevitable that a player will be seriously injured in those circumstances, and it's also inevitable that the quality of the competition will be compromised," Schwab said.
Melbourne has already had to back up within 48 hours in recent weeks, playing its major semi-final in Sydney just two days before it took on Korean side Seongnam in the ACL. At least both of those matches were in Australia.
Melbourne faces the ridiculous situation of having to fly out to Japan at 1:05am on Sunday morning, just hours after the Grand Final against Sydney.
Schwab said there were several issues around scheduling of both domestic and international games that it was hoping to get resolved. He said the PFA was adamant that the A-League season needed to finish in May.
"I think scheduling is one of the biggest issues that we face. I think there has to be respect for the international match calendar. We obviously have difficulty in terms of the AFC in achieving that, But the guiding principal has to be quality," he said.
"I think the fans are entitled top see the best players playing in every game. I think it's very unfortunate when they are unable to, because players have to make a choice between club and country."
"It's a choice players don't want to make. Players have to play for their club and they want to play for their country. They love both and I think it’s something which we need to address as a sport. We've long advocated our season running through to May. We'll continue to advocate for that. Because we can then see players manage those transitions a lot more smoothly."