EFL face congestion question as internationals forms 'madness' of a schedule for Bristol Rovers..by Daniel Hargraves.Regardless of what you decipher to be the total of remaining matches in a season that represents 'the run-in', Bristol Rovers very much find themselves at the tail end of the campaign with 10 League One games left to play, starting with Tuesday night's trip to Fleetwood Town.
From tomorrow until April 27 when Rovers conclude their season with a trip to Wigan Athletic, there are 47 days left of this term which works out at an average of one game every 4.7 days. However, confirmation that the home game against Reading, originally scheduled for March 23, will now be played on April 9 due to international call-ups in the Royals camp has meant that the Gas now face a seriously congested conclusion to the season.
It came to no surprise that the fixture was rearranged given that there were enough internationals in Reading's squad for the reverse fixture to be postponed earlier in the season while the January arrivals of Indonesia and Costa Rica regulars Elkan Baggott and Brandon Aguilera meant that Rovers themselves were likely to have at least a few away. However, it seemed the likely scenario weeks ago, yet it has taken until the fixture being less than three weeks away to confirm the postponement and rearranged date.
Although the Gas have certainly benefitted from having clear weeks between games since the trip to Northampton Town last month, you do wonder whether at least one of those midweek slots could have been filled with a rearranged fixture because they will now have to play their final eight matches of the season in 30 days, something that Matt Taylor described as "madness" when discussing the time frame in which his team will have to play out the rest of their schedule.
"That is madness because I guarantee that we won’t be at our very best during those games," the Gas manager said around the congestion his side will face when they return to action after the internationals. "We’ll pick up injuries, we’ll pick up problems and it will hamper us.
"It’s great when people say you’ve got games in hand on the rest of the league but when it takes its toll like it has done then it’s a real problem.
"I don’t know whether there’s more international players now in League One and Two but not only do we have some full internationals, we’ve got a lot in under-20s and other age groups. Maybe the quality is starting to drip feed further down the leagues.
"The Premier League and Championship is a lot simpler but the Premier League play less games and there’s a reason why they say that the Championship is the hardest league in the world, it’s because in amongst the actual game moments, there’s just too many."
There are two ways to look at the situation that Rovers will face in eight days' time. On one side, a welcome 13-day break from competitive action will follow for the vast majority of players after a busy week of travels with the best part of 750 miles set to be clocked after trips to Fleetwood and Lincoln City this week. However, on the other, an average of one game every 3.75 days will follow from the Good Friday trip to Port Vale until the final day at Wigan.
i2-prod.bristolpost.co.uk/incoming/article9154363.ece/ALTERNATES/s810/0_3567050.jpgIt's a conversation that's been shelved for a couple of months after being a major topic of discussion earlier in the season. Does League One now need to have international breaks integrated into the calendar?
This is the fifth game for Rovers this season that has been postponed, the fourth of which due to internationals. The Gas and Cambridge United's respective progress to the FA Cup third round meant that their meeting at the Mem originally scheduled for early January will now be played on April 16 which is a perfectly understandable situation. However, the Pirates have been a team that have particularly suffered this season from having games called off because of, using Taylor's words, their fragility.
In fairness, this is the first time since the 42-year-old took charge that a match has been called off for internationals with the reverse fixture against Reading and the home games against Exeter City and Fleetwood originally scheduled prior to his arrival in December. However, from those three games, which were all rearranged from Saturday 3pm kick-offs to midweek clashes, the Gas collected one point and evidently struggled in each.
At the time of writing, four of the League One matches scheduled for March 23 have already been called off and the expectation is that more will follow as call-ups continue to be announced ahead of internationals beginning next week. Currently that's not enough evidence to even merely suggest a set international break would be worthwhile. However, the previous match weeks of September 9, October 14 and November 18 that clashed with internationals saw just two, four and two fixtures survive respectively.
Whether it's due to more players representing countries standing lower in the FIFA rankings coming into the division or Premier League youngsters joining third-tier clubs on loan while representing their country's youth groups, it certainly feels as though call-ups will continue to take place leading to fixtures being postponed, thus creating unrealistic fixture loads.
However, for Taylor, he would rather play through despite being expected to have a couple of important players away on international duty because of the struggles his side have shown when having three-game weeks.
"It’s a good question and a difficult one to answer," the Gas boss declared when asked if he believes League One should have a set international break. "I think we’ve suffered more with the amount of fixtures we’ve had in congestion and that’s on the back of sometimes those international breaks in theory meaning rearranged fixtures.
"I think that affects this group of players and this squad this season more than what I’ve seen previously. We really struggle through three-game weeks and that run of fixtures so my preference now as Bristol Rovers manager would be that we play through international breaks regardless of people being absent because I’m not sure where you can fit it in.
"It always suits the bigger clubs because when players are away they’ve got their squads there and even if players aren’t available, three-game weeks suit them more. But if there was a better way to fit it into the calendar then you’d always say you want to play games of football when everyone’s available because that’s what fans pay their money for. They don’t want to be short changed in any way.
"I’ve probably answered it in two ways there, one to suit us and probably one to suit what I think football probably needs and fans need but I do feel like this group of players at this club this season has struggled with congested fixtures."
