Jurgen Klopp, Jose Mourinho and Pep Guardiola were just some of the high-profile managers to rally against England's football calendar last season. The intensity of the modern game is higher than it has ever been, meaning issues such as fatigue and fixture congestion have become more pronounced in recent years. And when bosses who have spent considerable chunks of their coaching careers in other countries come to England, they find a nation which has not yet adapted to the changing landscape.
There are several possible options to try and solve – or, at the very least, lessen - this problem, including scrapping the League Cup and reducing the size of the Premier League. Yet the simplest and most obvious - introducing a winter break - continues to be overlooked by the powers that be.
The most popular argument against the insertion of a mid-season pause relates to tradition: it is conventional for football to played during the festive period of Christmas and the New Year, and it would certainly be a shame to lose that. Premier League chiefs would also be understandably wary of giving up a slot in the year which they essentially have to themselves at present, with most other major European divisions taking time off in late December.
There is, however, no reason why the break could not come a little later, perhaps after the third round of the FA Cup in early January. It would not need to last for as long as a month, either: two weeks or so would suffice, as is the arrangement in France, Italy and Spain.
The other major criticism of the idea centres around the suspicion that Premier League outfits would simply use the break as an excuse to jet off to far-flung destinations to play lucrative friendly matches. There is certainly a reasonable chance of that happening, yet such trips would not be as physically or mentally demanding as three or four Premier League encounters in the same period of time. Moreover, clubs could simply opt against undertaking such endeavours and instead remain at home, which would probably give them an advantage in the second half of the campaign.
The potential introduction of a winter break tends to be discussed in terms of the benefits it would bring to the England national side, but the plus points would be felt in domestic football too. Forcing teams to play a full season without any sort of scheduled rest period not only increases the likelihood of injuries, it also harms the quality of football on show - which, needless to say, is to the detriment of the Premier League as a whole. It may also aid the performance of English sides in Europe; in the last few years, they have struggled to compete with the likes of Barcelona, Real Madrid, Juventus, Bayern Munich and Atletico Madrid in the Champions League.
A winter break would certainly not solve all of English football's ills, nor would it satisfy everyone. Nevertheless, the time has come for the Premier League to catch up with the rest of Europe and introduce one.
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