Incidence of Injuries in Elite Spanish Male Youth Football Players: A Season-Long Study with Under-10 to Under-18 Athletes

Abstract

The aim of this study was to analyse the injuries sustained by youth football players from a professional team of the Spanish League integrated into an elite academy, considering the sporting context, the month, and the category of the player throughout the 2017–2018 football season. A total of 227 players in under (U) age categories from U-10 to U-18, with two age-groups in each category (A and B), except U-18, with three groups (A, B and, C), were evaluated. Of the 242 cases, 196 injuries were observed. Injury recurrence or different injuries were observed in the same football player during the season, specifically in the older age categories. With regard to the location of injuries, sixteen different parts of the body were associated with injuries, with five of those totalizing the majority of incidence (162 injuries): the ankle (19), the foot (10), the hip (22), the knee (27), and the thigh (74). A negative relationship was observed between the sporting context and the number of injuries sustained (Rho = −0.203; p = 0.002), and a positive relationship between the category and the number of injuries was identified (Rho = 0.488; p < 0.001). Of the total, 118 injuries were sustained during training (62.8%), 70 were sustained in competitive moments (37.2%), and the remaining cases were associated with accidents outside football. The majority of injuries were muscular (101), followed by articular injuries (49), with both combined accounting for 150 of the total injuries. Though no relationship was observed between month and number of injuries (Rho = −0.024; p = 0.707), the months associated with the restart of training routines after interruptions (August, September, and January) were the highest, other than May, in which the highest number of injuries was observed. The findings in this study suggested that it is advisable to carry out a greater number of hours of injury prevention training in U-16 and U-18. Coaches should routinely monitor young players’ development in order to adapt and balance training interventions to individual needs, and they should consider implementing specific injury risk mitigation strategies in youth football based on the long-term development of the football players. Additionally, it is our understanding that it is essential to program, perform, and monitor specific training sessions or even specific training tasks considering the player’s category and long-term sporting development.