Celtic boss Brendan Rodgers says players must come first in reconstruction debate

Celtic boss Brendan Rodgers has said that player welfare needs to be at the heart of any discussion about league reconstruction and worries the global game could be headed for too much football.

The issue of reshaping the Scottish domestic game has resurfaced this week with news that an SPFL sub-committee is to consider changes the size of the Premiership, with an expansion or reduction of the top flight up for discussion.

The prospects of a return to a ten-team top flight are remote, and Rodgers made it clear it wasn’t an outcome he would welcome. The Celtic boss’ preference would be for a larger league if a change was made.

“Somebody mentioned the possibility of it getting smaller or increasing,” he said. “I certainly don’t think it needs to get smaller.

“If it goes any way there’s still a notion for me that we could bring a few more teams into the league.

“There’s maybe issues around TV revenue and what that would look like and might be a challenge to that.

“But from a football perspective I think an increase in the league would help.”

Rodgers’ concerns centre on the number of games that top professionals are being asked to play, in continental and global competition more than at home. He believes the expansion of competitions, and in particular the new-look Club World Cup that will debut this summer, shows money is being prioritised over players.

“I think the number here has been 38 games for a period of time,” he said. “I’m fairly comfortable with that.

“I think there’s lots of other football that gets added in and then obviously your recovery time gets diminished.

“I think especially when you’re a successful team you expect to play and to play more, and we accept that.

“When I look on the bigger picture of the game, there’s absolutely no doubt the recovery of players (is an issue), and I see the competition in the summer with teams that have a possibility of getting to the Champions League final and then literally a couple of weeks later going into a tournament that’s clearly driven by money. I don’t think there’s any doubt about that.

“It’s the players that will suffer in the end, as will the supporters. Because the quality of the game will suffer.

“There can be too much football. We all love it and I watch football from all around the world, games most nights and sometimes three or four games a day.

“But you’re risking showing too much and in time that might turn people off.

“So I think we have to be more careful with the game.”

Celtic have played 48 games already this season, with the league run-in and the Scottish Cup semi-final to come. Rodgers noted the winter break has gone from Scottish football but believes that the eventual changes to the calendar and the demand for more football will lead to a rethinking of breaks and breathers within the season.

“I have said before that I do think it will become a 12-month season,” he added. “We’ll have to look at different recovery periods other than in the summer. How it’s going, you can see more games being added but you look at winter breaks now being taken away.

“This season has been interesting because it’s been the first with the winter break and the extra Champions League games. So there’s no doubt that period was a tough one and we managed to get through it incredibly well. But that’s not to say that happens every season.

“Clubs like us are fortunate because we play more games and have a bigger squad to pull on. But there are other teams, and you look at the beginning of the season this year and the likes of Kilmarnock and St Mirren in European football have a real challenge.”