Chelsea manager Thomas Tuchel and his Liverpool counterpart, Jurgen Klopp have voiced their displeasure with the schedule of the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.
The tournament is set to hold between November 21 and December 18 and the Premier League season will be halted on November 12 until eight days after the World Cup is concluded.
Tuchel reckoned that the showpiece could have an emotional and physical effects on the players.
“It doesn’t make much sense,” Tuchel said in a news conference on Friday.
“The players are very focused on the World Cup already which is a good thing because they come in shape and they take care of themselves.
“But it’s a bad thing because they are also focused on World Cup and not just here. We will see how it influences the players and their performance in October when it gets closer.
“It will have a huge impact emotionally and physically on the players, they will come back drained. Big success and huge disappointment can also drain them mentally, and then days later we have Boxing day. I’m a bit uncertain about all this.”
Klopp said in a news conference that the World Cup was taking place for the wrong reasons.
“If you go to the final at a World Cup and win it or lose a third place match you are already quite busy and then the rest starts a week later,” Klopp said.
“If all the players then have a break it is not a problem, it is good. It is like a winter break which I had in Germany as a player a lot, four weeks (off) stuff like that.
“When I start talking about it,I get really angry…It is like the climate. We all know what has to change but nobody is saying what we have to do.
“There must be one meeting where they all talk to each other and the only subject should be the most important part of this game– the players.
“My problem is that as much as everybody knows it is not right, nobody talks often enough about it that it will be changed. Something has to change.
“This World Cup happens at the wrong moment for the wrong reasons.”
