Physical demands in Spanish male and female elite football referees during the competition: a prospective observational study

ABSTRACT

Objective

The aim of this study was to analyze the physical demands of elite male and female field referees in match play and compare the physical demands between male and female football referees in the competition.

Methods

Match data were collected from 36 elite football referees (19 males and 17 females) during a total of 409 football matches. Electronic performance and tracking systems based on global positioning systems (GPS) were used in this research.

Results

Male referees experienced significantly greater physical demands (p < 0.05) in men league than female referees in women league for total distance, explosive distance, high-intensity breaking distance, total of sprints, sprinting distance, high-speed running distance, high-speed running actions, maximal speed, total of accelerations and decelerations, maximal acceleration and deceleration, acceleration/deceleration.

Conclusions

Therefore, strength and conditioning coaches should consider these gender differences in match demands to maximize the fitness-fatigue response of the referees since this may lead to a better performance during the decision-making process in the competition.

KEYWORDS:

• Soccer
• women
• men
• monitoring
• technology
• team sports
• fitness

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethical approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Informed consent

The participants gave their verbally and written informed consent.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.