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It very often makes for some very boring soccer or gamesmanship that grinds on the nerves. The changes would eliminate time wasting, which teams engage in as a way of maintaining their lead or playing for a draw in the game’s dying minutes. It’s not a terrible thing given that effective playing time in MLS, for example, has dropped from 56.9 minutes per game last year to 55.3 minutes this season. MLS, before the pandemic, had said it was open to radical experimentation with the clock in an effort to reduce time wasting. The International Football Association Board, which makes changes to the sport in conjunction with FIFA, first said it would study such a plan back in 2017. Games would still fit into two-hour television windows, just without the time-wasting that plagues the sport today. No need for added time by the referee at the end of each half. The solution is to make games 60 minutes in length - each half lasting 30 minutes - with the referee stopping the clock whenever there is an injury, a goal, substitution and video review. These factors have all contributed to the decline in actual minutes the ball is in play. Since the pandemic, there is more use of video review across the globe and the normal three subs have been increased to five. These stats from just before the pandemic in the Premier League, and with instant replay in use, only further illustrates this point. The average time that the ball is in play is down almost exactly *1 whole minute* per game from the average over the previous 5 seasons. OPTA, which puts out analytics used by coaches and pundits alike, keeps records on something called “effective playing time.”Įffective Playing Time in the Premier League after VAR was introduced… How much soccer did you watch this past week? If you watched any of Europe’s top five domestic competitions or even the Champions League, you didn’t actually see as much as you think. Why watch a live game when you can play FIFA on your PlayStation? Why attend a match when you can catch the highlights on your phone later? Overall, soccer has not, but could find itself in a similar position in the coming years. Many sports, most notably baseball, have struggled to attract younger fans. As a result, the time is now to add a stop clock to soccer. You see, younger audiences (those of you raised on a diet of video games and short YouTube videos) are increasingly becoming disinterested in sports as attention spans continue to shrink. One plan, however, that I have embraced is shortening soccer games - but only if it’s done correctly and without altering the sport as we know it. It would dilute the world’s greatest sporting event.

More goals doesn’t always make for a better game.įIFA has recently intensified its push to want to hold the World Cup every two years, rather than the current four. When crazy ideas were thrown out around enlarging goals, I was the first to denounce those notions as idiotic. The time is now to make soccer games shorter and here’s how. Younger audiences, raised on video games and YouTube, have grown increasingly disinterested in sports. By Clemente Lisi 12 months ago Follow Tweet