Graphic: Kunle Odetoyinbo's guide to getting into shape for the new season

Footballers need a high level of specific fitness to cope with the demands of a competitive season. Many say that a good preseason is crucial if they are to play well during the campaign. For us at Reading, preseason means bridging the gap from one season to the next and it begins from the moment the last ball is kicked in May.

We divide preseason into two areas: the maintenance period and the rebuilding phase. The first is an individually tailored off-season programme that acts as a transition between seasons and helps players to improve weak areas and prevent injuries. Then comes the rebuilding, which is what is happening now.

Fitness training is generally divided into aerobic, anaerobic and specific muscle training. Other factors that are important to a player’s progress are his genetic background, nutrition and mental fitness. Players often fear preseason based on the old perception that they will be running for long periods without sight of the football. Others relish the physical challenge.

Once players return they are usually screened medically and physically. For instance, body composition is assessed and compared with the previous season’s scores. This will include body weight, fat percentage and lean body composition (the weight of bones, muscles and organs). Goals will have been set for each player and incorporated through training and nutrition into their off-season work. So it is normal for players to return within the guidelines. Further screening, taking into account medical history, may involve a range of activity, including musculoskeletal assessments, blood profiles and health status.

During the maintenance phase, when training is reduced, some physiological factors hardly change, such as a player’s maximum oxygen uptake, but others – for example, muscular endurance – can quickly reduce. In other words, players lose the ability to exercise at very high intensity for the 90 minutes required in a game.

It takes time to redress this situation, so training initially involves exercises that stress this system to improve this area of fitness. Traditionally, footballers would embark on long, fairly slow runs. Science has discovered that high-intensity, shorter-duration activities are effective much more quickly.

While aerobic stamina is key, there are other important areas of fitness: Balance: the ability to control the body’s position, either stationary or while moving (for example, when dribbling or trying to lose a marker). Flexibility: achieving an extended range of motion without being impeded by excess tissue, ie, fat or muscle (for example, executing a leg split). Local muscle endurance: a single muscle’s ability to perform sustained work (for example, rowing or cycling).

Strength endurance: a muscle’s ability to perform a maximum contraction time after time (for example, repeated striking of the ball over long distances by a goalkeeper). Strength: the extent to which muscles can exert force by contracting against resistance (for example, restraining an opponent at set plays). Power: the ability to exert maximum muscular contraction instantly in an explosive burst of movements. The two components of power are strength and speed (for example, a sprint start to get to a ball).

Agility: the ability to perform fast movements in rapid succession in opposing directions (for example, lateral, forward and backwards movements). Coordination: this is a summation of all of the components of fitness in that it brings them all together so that they work best in training and matches, relative to playing position.

Training is monitored and controlled via heartrate measurements. At Reading we use the Activio heartrate telemetry system. This requires players to wear a chest belt from the moment they enter the training ground and it records their heartrate and sends the data to a remote computer. This allows sessions to be designed to produce the desired level of workrate and all the players’ responses to training are recorded and assessed by the sports science staff.

For instance, we may ask players to perform an interval running session around the pitch with and without the ball. It is a high-intensity aerobic-type session that can be manipulated and adapted. The players will typically work at 75 to 85 per cent of their heartrate maximum without the ball and when the ball is included this can rise to 80 to 95 per cent.

Strength training is important to lessen the impact of, or potential for, injury. We run a programme that mainly uses the Olympic lifts. These may include squatting, “power cleaning” and lunging. Players also do “plyo-metric training” to develop power. These exercises require players to load and extend muscles quickly in strong movements and are very demanding, requiring up to two days to recover.

Because key movements in football are performed at high pace, players train to improve speed over various distances, with and without the ball. An example of a session could be: six to eight squat jumps three times, eight skips for height three times, eight hops for distance per leg three times, three 30-metre runs towing weights and five 30-metre sprints. Acceleration training is also important.

It is all designed to boost endurance, strength, power and pace in tandem with the development of technique, tactics and teamwork. Football is an art with a significant contribution from science.

The object of the exercise

A typical week for players in the “rebuilding” phase of preseason

Sunday Rest.

Monday: Morning Warm-up, 15min. Interval running with and without ball, 40min. Technical work, 40min. Cool down, 15min. Ice bath, massage. Afternoon Gym-based conditioning. Olympic-style weight lifts, core stability training, flexibility, 60min. Cool down, 15min.

Tuesday: Morning Warm-up, 15min. Technical work, 70min. Cool down, 15min. Ice bath, massage. Afternoon Cardiovascular training in swimming pool, 60min.

Wednesday Warm-up, 15min. Light tactical work, 60min. Cool down, 15min.

Thursday Prematch meal, 4.15pm. Match, 7.45pm. Warm-down, 15 min.

Friday Warm-up, 15min. Recovery training, head tennis, light jog, ice bath and rest.

Saturday Prematch meal, 11.30am. Match, 3pm. Warm-down, 15 min.

Year-long excuse to stick to strict diet of football

If the mere mention of exercise makes you want to run a mile in the other direction – not that you are fit enough to do that – then do not feel excluded by all the talk of training regimes and conditioning on these pages.

If, for you, coordination involves ordering a pizza in time for kick-off and warm-up is what you do to leftover curry, the close season need not force you to change your habits.

Thanks to the proliferation of sport channels on television, you can emulate Homer Simpson all year round, if you must. There is plenty of football to keep the viewer ticking over during the close season, so there is no excuse for feeling unprepared when the domestic campaign starts next month. You, your couch, your screen and the contents of your fridge should gel instantly.

There are nearly 30 live matches on television over the next week, if we include beach soccer – and as it is summer, why not. There are three friendlies on the television this evening alone: Burgenland XI v Arsenal (Arsenal TV), Cobh Ramblers v Sunderland (Setanta Sports 2) and Norwich City v Tottenham Hotspur (Setanta Sports 1).

But perhaps the ideal solution is to combine watching with doing. Why not do a press-up every time a substitution is made and a sit-up whenever a manager says “it was a good workout”? You will be fit in no time.

Words by Tom Dart

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