Football is the most widely played sport in the world, with over 265 million men and women participating in the sport. Injuries in football are unfortunately exceedingly common. They occur more frequently in younger players, with 80% of injuries occurring in players under the age of 24 and 44% of injuries occurring in players under the age of 15. 1 Injury rates in female players tend to be higher for ACL injuries and concussions. Injuries can have a significant physical, emotional, psychosocial and financial impact on both the individual and the team. The long-term sequelae for many injuries can be deleterious.
Over the past two decades, there have been significant strides in the realm of football injury prevention. F-MARC has published a number of papers which have investigated this subject. The FIFA 11+ injury-prevention programme has been developed and validated in both male and female football players. A specific version for kids and referees has also been created.
This module will discuss these prevention efforts at length and will elucidate how individuals and teams around the globe can easily add prevention methodology into their weekly training regimen.
