Opinion | Saturday, 14th July 2018

World Cup 2018: Fuelling a footballer

Sports nutritionist help footballers properly fuel for and recover after games

By James Cameron, Lecturer in Sports and Exercise Nutrition at Manchester Metropolitan University.

In modern sport, it is becoming more and more about those small changes that can help an athlete achieve their potential. This is especially true for today’s footballers.

It takes work from many experts to help keep footballers in perfect shape. One of these experts is a sports nutritionist - it is their role to help footballers properly fuel for and recover after games.

When it comes to a World Cup, games come thick and fast, and this is on top of already completing a rigorous season for club teams. Therefore, it is key that players have their own personalised nutrition strategy.

This will depend on position played, intensity of the game, temperature, humidity, which influence individual sweat rates and sodium losses. Making sure all these variables are considered will help maintain performance and health of the players.

To help players perform to they require the correct amount of carbohydrates. To fuel muscles, they need proteins. To help with repair muscle damage, they need fat. They need to maintain hydration for vitamin absorption and healthy hormone production.

For aspiring footballers looking to help improve their own game, improving your nutritional intake is one way to help give yourself more energy during games and improve recovery after games.

Meals full of macro and micro nutrients are required to help your body perform optimally – this meal could be eaten pre-match or post-match to help improve performance or recovery.