Is 40 the new 30 for elite footballers? Traditionally, 30 was always seen as a milestone for those playing at the top level. Players approaching that grand old age (please do sense the sarcasm here), were typically offered contracts of a shorter length, reflecting their proximity to the intimidatingly thick black line that is turning 30.
Some even had a policy, restricting them to only offering one-year contract extensions to players in their thirties (something Real Madrid still mostly do). But in recent years, the alarm bells that used to sound any time a chief executive looked at extending the contract of a player whose age starts with a ‘3’ have become less, well, alarming.
In 2022, Mohamed Salah signed a three-year contract at Liverpool with a weekly salary of more than £350,000 ($430,000) just after he had turned 30. The year before, his team-mate Virgil van Dijk sealed a four-year deal at the same age, then captain Jordan Henderson did the same at the age of 31.
Maybe those are standout cases for particularly standout players, but look elsewhere and there are further hints of decreasing nervousness about taking on or keeping hold of a player who has crossed the thick black line: Manchester United signing 30-year-old Brazil midfielder Casemiro on a four-year deal in 2022, Fulham signing Raul Jimenez from Wolves on a two-year deal (with an option for a third) at the age of 32 in 2023, Kyle Walker signing a two-year deal at Manchester City aged 33 in 2023, and Brighton & Hove Albion captain Lewis Dunk signing a three-year contract in 2023 at the age of 31.
One of the players who could be considered at least partly responsible for this shift in attitude is Cristiano Ronaldo, who smashed through the 40 barrier last week. The man who scored more goals in his thirties (460) than in his twenties (440), has been involved in more than 30 per cent of the matches ever played by the Portugal national team, and is approaching what could be his sixth World Cup, is often held up as an example to young players for his work ethic and dedication.
Indeed, the night before his big birthday, the Al Nassr forward posted an Instagram story showing himself with both legs encased in cryotherapy wraps, designed to enhance recovery. Though he knows retirement is near, in an interview with journalist Edu Aguirre that aired on Spanish television during his birthday week, Ronaldo said he does not think about it “consciously”. Instead, he thinks about “going for as long as possible, until I can’t give any more”.
We think about Ronaldo as being an outlier (along with Lionel Messi, who won the Ballon d’Or for a record eighth time in 2023 at 36). But what if that is starting to change? The table below breaks down the median age of Premier League players for each position across every season since 2010. It shows that, over the past 15 years, the age distribution of defenders and midfielders has been relatively stable, with the ages of forwards and, particularly, goalkeepers being more volatile.
But is that set to change over the next decade? Will we see more players continuing into their late thirties and even forties as advances in sports science and nutrition continue to develop?
Robin Thorpe is a sports scientist who spent 10 years at Manchester United between 2009 and 2019, working his way up from a research sports scientist to senior performance scientist and head of recovery and regeneration. During his time at the club, the approach to players and age changed, largely based on one specific area: recovery.
When Thorpe started at Manchester United, manager Sir Alex Ferguson wanted answers. He wanted to know, ‘Are the players ready to play? Are they ready to train optimally?’. “We didn’t have any robust ways to differentiate between players who were ready and those who might need more time to recover,” says Thorpe. “And so the most crude way to do that would be to separate players by age.
“If we were playing on a Saturday, then had Sunday off and Monday was the first day back in, we would use age as an indicator for who could train again and who needed an extra recovery day. It might have been that the players in the over-32 bracket would automatically be given an extra day to recover.”
Ferguson wanted a more individualised method of differentiating between players who were ready and those who might need more time to recover.
Thorpe undertook extensive research (part of an applied PhD) to try to provide answers. First, they needed to understand exactly what footballers are asked to do in the contemporary game.
“We needed to identify the physical demands to work out where to employ monitoring and tracking tools. Then we could start to measure some different systems that make up the demands of being a footballer who is playing once, twice or three times a week. At that time, the demands were substantially increasing.
“We came back with many different measures, metrics and tracking techniques and over a few years, we refined that into five or six areas. Once we had those, we’d track these measures and metrics two days after every game. Most importantly, we established which of these metrics was the most sensitive to changes in training and match stress.”
Sir Alex Ferguson (right) wanted to know if Paul Scholes and other players were training optimally (John Peters/Getty Images)
Also crucial to the process was an algorithm Thorpe and his team created that took in those five or six key metrics and provided a simple answer to the coach or manager’s question about how players had responded after the previous match. For those who may have responded poorly, it gave some direction to the sports science and medical team about what was needed to accelerate their physical and mental status before the next game.
Once that intelligence was in place, every player would be assessed. For those who might previously have been given an extra day of recovery based on their age, it meant that they could instead be exposed to an extra day of training. “The more times we can push at the right time, the better they can be technically and physically improved and developed,” says Thorpe.
“Every day that we can put you with a coach is a plus. But if it’s a time when it could be detrimental to a player’s longer-term development and injury-risk status that’s when we recommend alternative methods to develop their readiness status.”
Instead of those decisions being solely based on age, Thorpe learned that there were some times when a player in that 32-plus bracket did not need an extra day’s recovery. “We were starting to be really individual and context-driven in our decision-making, which leads to a higher probability of putting extra years on a players’ life cycle,” says Thorpe.
“Knowing when to push them can help players play longer. There are times when you’re playing three games a week and more often than not you’re consolidating the recovery of players but certainly during pre-season or the early phase of the season or when players are not playing frequently, that’s the time to push them. We’re here to push the boundaries. That’s where sports science began — how can we maximise human performance?”
With more applied research on footballers available, there is more knowledge than ever about footballers and what they need to perform at their best. That knowledge, says Thorpe, is not only about helping players recover but making them better athletes — which could help them maintain their levels for longer.
“Now we’re starting to periodise nutrition; using it not just to recover but also to develop the athlete in certain periods. That’s the same for recovery strategies. There are certain scenarios where we’re using things that we once thought were just about recovery but we’re using them to make players fitter.
“We’ve moved to another level with the advances in applied science in football, and that could be one reason we are advancing players’ capacities.”
Supplementation is big business and elite athletes are a prime target for brands and products looking to become the ‘next big thing’ in performance nutrition. But how much of a difference do the pills and potions actually make? Are they among the factors that could increase players’ longevity?
Dr Rob Naughton, a performance nutritionist who has worked with professional football clubs and privately with international players on behalf of INTRA Performance Group, answers that pretty bluntly: “The thing with nutrition is that nothing really changes. Nutrition science has come on quite a lot but it’s been well established for quite a long time now of what is required overall.”
Newcastle’s Bruno Guimaraes and Joelinton ticking two boxes at once (Serena Taylor/Getty Images)
What has changed, though, is the approach towards performance nutrition, says Naughton, referring to the periodised method that Thorpe mentioned. “It’s one of the biggest things to come out in the last decade,” says Naughton. “For example, if a footballer plays on a Saturday and then has a rest before the following Saturday’s game, their carb intake for that week looks different than if they go: Saturday-Wednesday-Saturday.
“That sounds basic but it was initially more linked to endurance sport and has been adapted for football to compliment how training is periodised. So, during lower-intensity training days, their carb requirements are lower compared to when preparing for a game. It’s a way of helping them keep optimal body composition while also ensuring they are fuelling when they need to fuel.”
Allied with this is the emergence of a more personalised approach (something that has also happened with training), with more players hiring private nutritionists and even personal chefs to ensure they are ticking every possible box when it comes to food. Naughton fulfils that private nutritionist role for several footballers: “We’ll have high-performing footballers who might have a nutritionist at the club who deals with a more whole-team approach, but they’ll employ us to look solely at their (own) nutrition.”
The basics of a high-protein diet combined with an appropriate carbohydrate intake and lots of fruit and vegetables remain the same for most athletes, although the aim might vary depending on age or experience. Younger players need to develop physically while simultaneously trying to fuel performance and older ones are looking to maintain the power they already have.
“Muscle mass is an extremely important marker for strength,” says Naughton, “and strength is important for robustness and staying injury-free, as well as performance. Ronaldo is remarkable not just for the length of his career but also his availability throughout.”
Those two could be considered strongly linked — the fewer injuries a player suffers (particularly those that require surgery), the longer they can play. How much of that is linked to nutrition and training versus genetic good fortune is a subject in itself, but footballers are not immune to the desire to find a magic bullet that will allow them to be at their best for as long as possible.
Naughton says there has been research into cherry juice, turmeric and other supplements that could support recovery — but he warns that “people will overstate things trying to sell products. People got really excited about vitamin D around 15 years ago because they found loads of receptors in the body for vitamin D on all these different cells and thought, ‘They must be there for a reason’. It hasn’t yet transpired in the studies, though it is still important for bone health”.
Some players will latch on to products or nutrients, believing they can help them recover faster or mitigate the risk of injury. In an interview with the BBC in 2023, then-32-year-old former Crystal Palace winger Andros Townsend talked about eating chicken feet for the collagen it provides: “It tastes exactly like a chicken wing. It is low on meat, it has a lot of cartilage close to the bone. It’s got skin around it. It’s very nice.”
Andros Townsend ate chicken feet as a natural source of collagen (ANP/Getty Images)
Naughton says there is evidence to suggest that collagen helps with tendons and ligaments (as well as a bit of bone health), so it could be a helpful supplement for players recovering from injury and older athletes. But such supplements are, he says, “The icing sugar on the top of the cake.”
He continues: “If I was working with someone using a collagen product and they were convinced it was making a difference, I’m not going to rubbish it to them. I’ll accept it but also make sure the basics are taken care of too. As long as it’s not harmful to the athlete, doesn’t represent a doping risk or doesn’t replace good nutrition practices, then you accept certain practices.
“As a nutritionist, you have to get a bit of a buy-in. Someone who struggles with injuries might be thinking, ‘Why me?’. And if they take a collagen product and suddenly don’t get injured in three weeks, they’re going to be convinced — and nothing I do will convince them otherwise.
“Sometimes players get fixated on these things, but the best thing to do is to hit the basics and hit them consistently. Those who had longevity in their careers had really good practices — be it their nutrition or how they trained — and they’ve done them consistently.”
Alongside his longevity, Ronaldo’s physique is also considered aspirational — but what role does body composition play in helping footballers remain at the top level as they age? Most footballers now have an all-round ‘athletic’ build; is that helping them play for longer or is it just a by-product of the demands of the modern game?
“I can’t deny that body composition is important,” says Naughton, “but there’s certainly not a key ratio (for a player’s body fat percentage) and we are getting better at individualising what players should aim for. You will have some athletes come to you and say, ‘I want low body fat like Ronaldo’, but sometimes it just might not happen because your body is different and for you to get like that, you would have to eat a certain way that would not be conducive to good performance.”
Cristiano Ronaldo has never been shy of showing off his physique (Yasser Bakhsh/Getty Images)
Naughton uses the phrases “fighting weight” and “fighting composition” to help players understand where they are when performing at their best, and adds: “That obsession with being a certain body fat can have a detrimental effect. It can lead them down the route of under-fuelling, which can lead to several negative health and performance issues. Athletes have to look to optimise body composition but the optimisation is not about hitting an arbitrary magic number, it’s about optimising it for that player and their body and where they’re best at.”
If advances in sports science and nutrition are pulling in one direction, helping players to maintain a top level for longer, what about factors pulling the opposite way? Over the past year, players and managers have spoken up about the “increasing” number of games they are facing, with Manchester City midfielder Rodri suggesting footballers could even go on strike before he suffered a serious knee injury.
Bukayo Saka, 23, has already played 250 club games since his Arsenal debut in November 2018 — if he carries on into his late thirties, how many more could he play? But that is a big ‘if,’ given how much he has already played (not to mention how he has not played since December after suffering a hamstring injury that is anticipated to keep him out until March).
So, are the advances or developments in sports science and nutrition enough to balance these increasing demands?
What is also relevant here is Thorpe’s point about the greater understanding sports scientists now have of the most crucial factors in building elite footballers. “That is helping develop players who are not only world-class athletes but who are also robust and resilient, potentially protecting against injuries,” he says.
“Athletes can mitigate some of the factors that curtail careers or contribute towards what we see now as an appropriate age to retire from a high level.”
He also offers a slightly different view on the demands facing players now, saying that while research shows that the physical demands of the game increased between 2000 and the early 2010s, in the last six years or so, we’ve only seen “modest increases”. In an article published on LinkedIn, Thorpe writes that, compared to 10 years ago, “players generally are competing in a similar number of total games” and that when it comes to the physical demands of a typical Premier League match, certain playing positions have seen no change at all.
Elite players, including Rodri, have raised concerns over their hectic schedules (Michael Regan/Getty Images)
There have been changes to in-game officiating rules, however, which means that, on average, matches last longer than 10 years ago, increasing physical and mental demands. There have also been changes to the sequencing of games, says Thorpe, possibly because of changes in competition structure and more international fixtures at different times of the season. “That shift in sequencing could mean that monitoring and tracking systems should be used to mitigate potential risk when it comes to the athlete,” says Thorpe.
“This isn’t about holding players back: it’s about that dual approach around developing true athletes in the periods that you can (in pre-season or early season when there might only be one game a week or the sequencing of games isn’t as severe). But then when the sequencing of the games becomes quite demanding, that’s where good sports science and innovative tracking methods should help players compete more frequently and maybe for longer periods.”
Away from the sports science teams, have the attitudes of decision-makers at football clubs really changed in favour of older players? According to Adrian Bevington, managing director of the UK arm of football agency Pro Profil and an experienced advisor to club owners, more clubs now use data modelling to recruit. “They are a lot more regimented,” he says. “If a player is beyond a certain age or doesn’t hit certain metrics then whatever the eye might tell you, they’re not interested. And that often comes from the very top of a club. But each club has their own recruitment model, and you will see that evolve even more.”
He points to the examples set by Ronaldo (“an elite talent who has looked after himself like an elite athlete”), Jamie Vardy, who is still scoring goals in the Premier League at the age of 38, and “looks like he can run forever”, and James Milner, 39, and Adam Lallana, 36 (“experienced players who have looked after themselves and can bring great professionalism to a squad of younger players”), as those that should convince clubs to sometimes look beyond the data.
“For all of the modelling that goes on now, which is a real positive in many cases, you still have to look at individuals as individuals because everybody is different,” says Bevington. “If you’ve got a player in your club already who is a great professional, and maybe is on the wrong side of 30, but still offers so much to the squad on the pitch, there’s so much to be said for keeping them with extended contracts. You know what they offer and they can add so much benefit on and off the pitch.”
Cristiano Ronaldo with both legs encased in cryotherapy wraps last week (Cristiano Ronaldo/Instagram)
Thorpe says he is unsure whether attitudes within clubs have changed but, with the data now available, there is no need to rely on age when deciding a player’s future.
“Rather than looking at age as the limiting factor, if you can establish and quantify some of the qualities related to: can that athlete compete with the current demands that we know exist? Is the athlete robust? Is the athlete able to withstand demanding game sequencing? That’s information and intelligence that is really important for that topic.
“Age is important but some of the other factors we understand in more detail — robustness profile, recovery rate profile, for example — could potentially contribute to contract decisions.”
So, will we see more players reaching their late thirties and even entering their forties while still playing at the top level? Only time will tell. But there is certainly a belief that it’s possible, if things are done in the right way.
“If these sports performance, sports science, medicine and health approaches are done really well, at a world-class level, there is every possibility that we will see players playing at a relative level potentially for longer periods,” says Thorpe. “Or at least, we would definitely increase the probability of that happening because, in the past, maybe those approaches and support systems weren’t there and it was more survival of the fittest.
“Now, it’s still going to be survival of the fittest but there is more of a support structure and an identification system in place that allows the likelihood of more players competing for longer.”
(Top photos: Getty Images; Eamonn Dalton/The Athletic)
