{"id":35227,"date":"2022-12-02T16:38:26","date_gmt":"2022-12-02T21:38:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/?p=35227"},"modified":"2022-12-02T16:38:26","modified_gmt":"2022-12-02T21:38:26","slug":"all-about-womens-sports-arsenal-netherlands-star-vivianne-miedema-points-out-dangerous-schedule-for-women-soccer-players","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/2022\/12\/02\/all-about-womens-sports-arsenal-netherlands-star-vivianne-miedema-points-out-dangerous-schedule-for-women-soccer-players\/","title":{"rendered":"All About Women’s Sports: Arsenal, Netherlands star Vivianne Miedema Points Out Dangerous Schedule for Women Soccer Players"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Claire Guest<\/em><\/p>\n

Vivianne Miedema, star player for Arsenal and the Netherlands Women’s National Team, calls attention to the dangerously heavy schedule for women soccer players. <\/span><\/p>\n

After a fatiguing schedule of soccer matches, Miedema sees the succession of female soccer players getting injured. She insists the player\u2019s health should come first.<\/span><\/p>\n

With the growing popularity of women\u2019s soccer, the scheduling demands on these world-class players have grown exponentially. Miedema describes how the COVID-19 postponement of the Tokyo Olympics played in 2021 and the UEFA Women\u2019s European Championship played in 2022 meant the female soccer players have competed in lengthy, physically and mentally exhausting summer tournaments for five years straight (on top of their club team obligations). This is a grueling and dangerous schedule, even for top-level athletes.<\/span><\/p>\n

During the summer UEFA Women\u2019s Euros, Miedema was diagnosed with COVID-19 and was quarantined for several vital games. When she returned for a huge quarterfinal match against France, she played the entire 90 minutes, plus extra time for a total of 120 minutes. This came after not even one full day of recovering from her illness. <\/span><\/p>\n

This eventually led to Miedema taking a step back at the beginning of November from Arsenal due to sheer physical and mental exhaustion. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI felt that my mind and body were ready for a rest,\u201d she said at the time.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Miedema highlights the number of elite women’s soccer players who have torn their anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) due to an extensive amount of games played.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Beth Mead (left) with Vivianne Miedema. Photo Credit: Arsenal on Instagram<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This list includes 2021 and 2022 Ballon D\u2019Or winner Alexia Putellas, the UEFA Player of the Year and BBC Player of the Year Beth Mead, and many more big names in women\u2019s soccer. <\/span><\/p>\n

Mead, Miedema\u2019s partner, finished the WSL season and UEFA Women\u2019s Champion League, went straight into the summer starting every game for the England Lionesses, then went on to win the UEFA Women\u2019s Euros Tournament. After all of that, perhaps unsurprisingly, she tore her ACL in November when the WSL season started back up again.<\/span><\/p>\n

Miedema’s observations point out a disturbing trend in women’s soccer. While everyone has celebrated the incredible growth and interest in the sport, the schedule of these games is dangerously heavy for athletes (women or men) and needs to be balanced with player health and safety.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Claire Guest Vivianne Miedema, star player for Arsenal and the Netherlands Women’s National Team, calls attention to the dangerously heavy schedule for women soccer players. After a fatiguing schedule of soccer matches, Miedema sees the succession of female soccer players getting injured. She insists the player\u2019s health should come first. With the growing popularity […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21488,"featured_media":35229,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1024,1035,19],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35227"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21488"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35227"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35227\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35240,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35227\/revisions\/35240"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35229"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.bu.edu\/wtbu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}