65 minutes of additional time. That’s the total that has been added to regular time in just four matches. If this is explained by FIFA directives which want to increase the effective time, our consultants have mentioned this particular situation.
“I saw the United States dive against Wales. We couldn’t find their team. What amazes me are the cramps, the injury problems and players who are already exhausted. The schedules have been tightened so playing seven matches over 28 days without talking about extra time which could be 140 minutes if it continues like this is untenable.”first explained Marc Wilmots.
In the same line, Swann Borsellino talked about changing the rule at the base. “When you want to cut the pear in half and you don’t make a decision, you make a bad one. Either we go to a basketball type model where the clock is stopped as soon as the ball is offside and we play really twice 45 or twice 30 minutes. Either, we adapt but it will not be possible like that for the players. We are already on a physical heresy for the players, if they start to play matches of twice 50 or 55 minutes, it’s going to be complicated.”mentioned our consultant.
Guest on the set, the journalist Philippe Auclairasserted that all of this may well have a logic behind it: “I fall a bit into my conspiracy theory, but if we wanted to achieve a change in the rules of the laws of the game concerning the duration of matches by saying ‘It takes 55 or 60 minutes of effective time, look when we play matches and take into account stoppages, that makes matches lasting 120 minutes’. By the absurd, we show that we have to make football matches in which we stop the clock.
