Gradual increase in the risk of match injury in Norwegian male professional football: A 6‐year prospective study

Abstract

The aim of this study was to monitor injury incidence and pattern in Norwegian male professional football over six consecutive seasons and compare the risk of injury between the preseason and competitive season. All time loss injuries were recorded by the medical staff of each club. In total, 2365 injuries were recorded. The incidence of acute injuries was 15.9/1000 match hours [95% confidence interval (CI): 14.9-16.8], 1.9/1000 training hours (95% CI: 1.7-2.0), and 1.4 (95% CI: 1.3-1.5) overuse injuries/1000 h. A linear regression model found an annual increase of 1.06 acute match injuries/1000 h (95% CI: 0.40-1.73), corresponding to a total increase of 49% during the 6-year study period. When accounting for interteam variation and clustering effects using a general estimating equation model, the increase in injury incidence was 0.92 (95% CI: -0.11-1.95, P = 0.083). No difference in the risk of acute match injuries (rate ratio (RR): 0.86, 95% CI: 0.73-1.01), acute training injuries (RR: 1.16, 95% CI: 0.99-1.36), or overuse injuries (RR: 1.04, 95% CI: 0.89-1.21) was observed between the preseason and competitive season. In conclusion, the overall risk of acute match injuries in Norwegian male professional football increased by 49% during the study period, although this increase was not fully consistent across teams. We detected no change in the risk of training and overuse injuries or any difference between the preseason and competitive season.

Match-related risk factors for injury in male professional football

“…The injury rate during the 15 seasons included in this thesis was 3.8 injuries/1000 hours of training exposure and 25.5 injuries/1000 hours of match exposure. This is similar to the injury rates that have been reported from other similar cohorts [3,[25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32]. The most common injury type was muscle injuries, in line with previous studies of professional football.…”

“…The injury rate in male professional football in Europe has been reported in several large (including several teams) cohort studies in the 21 st century [3,[25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32]. In these studies, injury rates have been found to be much higher during match play compared with training.…”

“…One study, covering European professional football from 2001 to 2012, showed that injury rates, general as well as training and match injury rates specifically, remained stable over 11 seasons [26]. However, the other study, covering the first division in Norwegian football from 2002 to 2007, showed a 49% increase in the acute match injury rate over the six-season period [32]. The injury rates for different injury types have developed differently in recent years.…”

“…In epidemiological studies of football, on average 65% of all reported injuries have been considered to be traumatic (ranging from 34% to 81%) (table 3). Overuse injuries, complaints with gradual onset that are caused by repeated (micro) trauma rather than one identifiable event, [24] have been found to be less frequent [3,25,26,[28][29][30][31][32]. However, it should be acknowledged that the amount of overuse injuries may be underreported in studies using a time loss definition of injury because these injuries will not always cause time loss even though they might have substantial impact on athletes' health and performance [40].…”

Emergence of Contact Injuries in Invasion Team Sports: An Ecological Dynamics Rationale

“…For instance, in elite levelelite-level football, medical reports indicate that between 44% -59%44 and 59 % of all acute match injuries are caused by contacts between opposing players during tackling and collisions [1]. Indeed, there has been an increase in the number of between-opponent contacts (heading and tackling duels) in the last decade [2].…”