There has been talk recently of a footballer's strike. One player pushing for it is Manchester City midfielder Rodri.

Players are complaining that they play too much football, which is unsustainable - they are right. 

Football bosses have, to a degree, always treated players as commodities but this seems to have reached a new level in the modern era.

Players have literally become assets to be worked to near exhaustion in the name of making money.

The intensity of the fixture list has been growing over the years. Domestically there is the Premier League, the Carabao Cup and FA Cups plus another long list for teams in European competition.

Last season, Manchester City's Phil Foden, played 72 games.

Paul Donovan says that football players are being played to exhaustionPaul Donovan says that football players are being played to exhaustion On top of these competitions come the totally commercially focused club tours to countries like China, Australia and Hong Kong. These are pre- and post-season to promote the brand.

The summer break for players to recuperate is shrinking all the time.

Then there are the international games - possibly the most farcical. Competitions like the World Cup and European Championships have been extended to month-long extravaganzas to extract maximum financial return for organisers. 

Then unbelievably, as seen this year, less than two months after the end of the European Championships, the players are back competing in the Nations Cup. A competition put in to replace pointless friendlies with another form of pointlessness.

These fixtures in September, October and November, then March and April put pressure on domestic competitions, creating a pile-up of fixtures in December and February. There has been a winter break engineered in January, but this is being constantly eroded.

Many players get injured with increasing numbers approaching burnout.

At the present rate, it is estimated that Real Madrid and England star Jude Bellingham will play more than 1,200 games in his career. 

Critics will claim players are paid huge amounts of money so must expect to do more. But a high salary is no reason to just work people into the ground. It also won't help club owners if their prized assets are injured on the sidelines.

So, the players are right to threaten a strike. They are also getting support from a variety of authority bodies.

What is for sure is a cut in games would benefit all parties concerned. Think of the bigger picture rather than the need to simply sweat assets (players) to make more money.

Everyone is a human being at the end of the day and has rights.

  • Paul Donovan is Labour councillor for Wanstead Village ward, Redbridge Council and a blogger (paulfdonovan.blogspot.com).