Manchester City’s Rodri hints at player strike due to busy schedule

Manchester City’s Rodri signals strike over jampacked schedules ahead of UCL expansion.

As Manchester City kicks off their new Champions League campaign at home to Inter Milan, Spanish midfielder Rodri cautioned that players may strike if the schedules intensify. The revamped tournament features 36 teams, adding two more games to each side. Additionally, at the end of the season, there is also an expanded Club World Cup in which City will participate as well. Rodri’s main concern reflects the growing discontent among players with their overticked calendar.

“Yes, I think we are close to that,” said Rodri when asked on Tuesday if there was a possibility of players going on strike.

“If it keeps this way we will have no other option. It is something that worries us.”

City manager Pep Guardiola was more diplomatic, saying: “We are in our first game, then the second and we will see what happens in the last games to go through.

“It is not necessary to look now. It’s in the future. We will see.”

Recently, Liverpool goalkeeper Alisson, also added his frustration on players being ignored by the administration, pointing out that the footballing body only focuses on feeding the fans with games.

“Sometimes nobody asks the players what they think about adding more games,” Alisson told reporters on Monday.

“Maybe our opinion doesn’t matter, but everybody knows what we think about having more games. Everybody’s tired of that.”

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