The impact that holding a Winter World Cup will have on domestic competitions has been revealed with the publication of the 2022/23 Premier League season dates.
The 2022 edition of the World Cup will be held in Qatar between 21 November and 16 December, right in the middle of a normal season.
World Cups are normally held in summer months in the Northern Hemisphere, but due to the fierce heat in the Middle East kingdom at that time of year, it has had to be shifted back five months.
To accommodate that, therefore, the Premier League will be taking a six-week break. The last round of fixtures took place on the weekend of 12 and 13 November, before resuming with the traditional round of Boxing Day matches.
The season will also start a week earlier than normal, on 6 August, and continue through to the end of May, with, as usual, the final round of matches all taking place simultaneously.
As a consequence, the FA Cup and the Champions League Finals will both be pushed into June.
Although not yet confirmed, UEFA is thought to be planning to conclude all the group stages of the Champions League before the start of the World Cup, which will mean even more fixture congestion for the top clubs.
The timing is unlikely to have pleased either domestic or international teams.
Leading players have had little rest for two years, in 2020 because the close season was truncated by the pandemic and this year because many of them were involved with their countries at the Euros.
With the season starting early, they will also struggle to get the minimum three week’s rest suggested by the players’ union FIFPro, especially if their clubs decided to organise lucrative pre-season tours.
And with the schedule as hectic as it is, chances for downtime in the season itself will be few and far between.
Meanwhile, those in charge of international sides will lament the fact that they will have almost no time to work with their players before the tournament begins, especially given the need to fly to the Middle East and acclimatise.