MLS: Managing truncated season vital

If and when MLS does return, teams will have to deal a massively truncated season. How they handle this change in schedule will be vital.

Like all sport at present, Major League Soccer has been postponed due to the coronavirus. The league took the initial decision to suspend play for three weeks, before extending that date until May 10th. It is likely to be extended further as the outbreak continues to spread.

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Unlike many other leagues around the world, MLS has a distinct advantage in trying to maintain its usual schedule. Upon the initial postponement, the current season was only two weeks old. Many of the cup competitions had not started yet and can easily be cancelled entirely, while the end of the season can be pushed back until December. There is a much greater margin for error.

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However, with the larger likelihood that the season will be played in one form or another, where in Europe there is a growing threat that the season might have to be cancelled with no time to restar games, in MLS, teams must prepare for the eventuality of games being played, even in a truncated, packed fashion.

This will have an untold impact on the quality of the matches, the readiness of the teams, the fitness of the players, and several other, unforeseen consequences. And this week, Philadelphia Union head coach Jim Curtin revealed that players will have to be extremely fit to deal with the physical demands of playing a full or close to a full season over a shortened period.

Speaking with podcast Sons of Ben: The Pod, Curtin said:

"“We’re going to be playing – the commissioner is pretty adamant about playing all 32 games that are left, so it’s going to be Saturday-Wednesday-Saturday and you better be in shape. We’re going to need our whole roster to be in shape, too, so it puts a real premium on home games. The points you get in home games are always important, but now our stadium, we have to take three points every time we play there because we’re going to be going Saturday, probably on the road on a Wednesday and you might have to play your second group when you come back to home on that following Saturday. You have to get those points.”"

During CONCACAF Champions League play and the latter stages of the U.S. Open Cup, MLS teams have experienced the mid-week-weekend rotation of matches and struggled as a result. In fact, Toronto FC missed the playoffs after winning MLS Cup and making the 2018 CCL final as they rotated between two teams during the early part of the season.

Playing on weekends and then Wednesdays and then the next weekend is difficult enough as it is. Throw in the travel that MLS incorporates, which makes the league unique around the world, and suddenly you can see just how difficult this truncated campaign would be.

As Curtin rightly highlights, then, building up and maintaining the fitness of the players will be critical to building a successful team in this unique 2020 season. And given that there will be no first-team training for some time, that is not going to be easy.