With the amount of sports being played, players have often lamented about workload. The term is not just limited to cricket as France's World Cup winner and Manchester United defender Raphael Varane recently stressed on the same, days after announcing his retirement from international football at the age of 29.
"The very highest level is like a washing machine, you play all the time and you never stop," the Manchester United defender told Canal Plus last week. "We have overloaded schedules and play non-stop. Right now, I feel like I'm suffocating and that the player is gobbling up the man," he added.
Varane is not the only international player to raise such concerns. The likes of Saliou Ciss, Jonathan David, Mathew Ryan, Arturo Vidal, and Maya Yoshida have also spoke on the subject previously, with all expressing concern on the packed match schedule.
The same was also discussed during BCCI's review meeting earlier this year, which was attended by board president Roger Binny, Secretary Jay Shah, captain Rohit Sharma, head coach Rahul Dravid, Head of Cricket at the National Cricket Academy (NCA) VVS Laxman and Chairman of Senior Selection Committee Chetan Sharma.
{{/usCountry}}The same was also discussed during BCCI's review meeting earlier this year, which was attended by board president Roger Binny, Secretary Jay Shah, captain Rohit Sharma, head coach Rahul Dravid, Head of Cricket at the National Cricket Academy (NCA) VVS Laxman and Chairman of Senior Selection Committee Chetan Sharma.
{{/usCountry}}Earlier we have seen players in their prime such as Ben Stokes give up on one format.
However, when India spinner R Ashwin asked fans to share their views on the subject, he was bemused with some of the opinions. In fact he shared one of the comments on his YouTube channel, questioning his stance.
“One of the guys commented, ‘What workload, dude? In our days, we played non-stop anywhere and everywhere without wearing slippers too. So, what difficulty do you have in playing? Stop complaining’. This was his comment, and he was a doctor as well. I don’t know if he is a real doctor or an aspiring one,” Ashwin said after reading his comment.
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Giving a perfect response to the “doctor”, who was not pleased with cricketers raising concern about workload, the spinner said the intensity between first-class cricket and international level aren't the same.
“The level of intensity won’t be the same. People who work five days a week and play during the weekend will wonder how good it will be if they play for all seven days. However, many of you may have experienced pain in hand and leg while playing. I am not stressing about the pain. Every player will have pain, but it is their profession,” the cricketer said in response to the comment.
Workload management has been a common talk these days. If we look at the Indian camp some of the big names, which include former captain Virat Kohli, have taken substantial break from the sport to recover from fatigue due to the tenacious schedule.