The league calendars don't wait for anyone for the Club World Cup.

PSG closed out last season on Sunday, July 13, in the Club World Cup final in New Jersey, USA, and will begin the next one on Wednesday, August 13 in Udine, Italy, in the European Super Cup against Tottenham . Between one match and the next, they will have had just 31 days to return from across the ocean, go on vacation, return, complete a seven-day mini preseason, travel to the Friuli Venezia-Giulia region, and compete for their first title of the season. Four matchdays later, on Sunday the 17th, they will make their French League debut against Nantes.

This is the situation for the European champion , who, like Real Madrid in the Spanish championship and Chelsea in the English championship, has not benefited, at least for the moment, from a measure of grace to have more days of preparation after reaching the outcome of the Club World Cup, the new FIFA tournament that has finished bursting the calendar of the elite of football.

The current football system operates under two premises: growth and fitting in, at the limits of the norm. No one gives in. Neither the international organizations, which are expanding, nor the national leagues, which feel invaded; so UEFA has maintained the date of the European Super Cup on August 13, in which the Parisian team, Champions League winner, will face Tottenham with barely a week to prepare, while the national leagues have not altered their schedules.

Two months ago, PSG asked Ligue 1 to postpone the first matchday and was denied. Just like in the Premier League, where there has been no respite either. Chelsea host Crystal Palace on Sunday the 17th, just 35 days after winning the Club World Cup. They haven't even scheduled the next day, which is the final day of the opening matchday. That Monday is for Leeds-Everton. City manager Pep Guardiola requested last fall a postponement of the opening two matchdays of the Premier League for them (the other English participant in the US event along with the Blues ), but was quickly denied. "Maybe in November, December, or January it will be a disaster, we'll be exhausted and the World Cup will have destroyed us," reacted the coach, who will start the domestic championship with an extra margin (46 days) thanks to their last-16 defeat to Al Hilal .

In Spain, the Competition Committee, a body that depends on the Spanish Federation although it is supposedly independent, ruled in favor of LaLiga and postponed Madrid's championship opener against Osasuna for Tuesday, August 19, as the employers' association wanted, despite the fact that the Whites and the AFE union, with the support of the Navarrese, requested it be moved to another date to allow for more preseason days (it will have 15).

AFE estimates the minimum should be four weeks, although it agreed on three with the dressing rooms of Real Madrid and Atlético Madrid (both Spanish teams at the World Cup) in view of the tight schedule. According to its version, it assumed that LaLiga would respect that deadline; however, the schedule for the first matchday only granted the Merengues two weeks of training. Since the collective bargaining agreement doesn't stipulate anything on this matter (it does stipulate vacation time: at least 21 consecutive days), the Sole Judge adhered to the literal meaning and the opinion of Javier Tebas prevailed, who has repeatedly expressed his outright opposition to the new World Cup. "My goal is for there to be no more," he stated.

In Italy and Germany, which start their leagues a week later (August 22-23-24) than in France, England, and Spain, the margin is greater. This is also because none of their teams (Inter, Juventus, Bayern, and Dortmund ) reached the semifinals, and the final nine days of the American tournament were omitted .

The situation, in any case, once again shows a two-speed schedule: the elite (or super-elite) and the rest. Madrid will arrive at the opening matchday two weeks into their season at Valdebebas, while Osasuna has already been in the Tajonar for three weeks, like almost all La Liga teams. Tottenham, who will also suffer this handicap this season due to having qualified for the Champions League, are the beneficiaries this time in the European Super Cup because 80 days will have passed since the end of last season, almost three times more than PSG.

A hopeless situation that squeezes the players at the top of the pyramid. Vitinha finished the World Cup with 67 matches (PSG and Portugal), and more than half of them were played with less than four days between each game, according to records from the global union Fifpro. Fede Valverde 's Excel form (72 matches with Madrid and Uruguay) is even worse, as in 68% of them he had less than four days of rest, to which must be added the overseas travel.

On July 13, PSG and Chelsea concluded an 11-month season that culminated in an unprecedented Club World Cup that enticed participants with a prize pool of one billion euros. On August 13, PSG and Tottenham will kick off another 11-month season leading up to a World Cup for national teams, the pinnacle of football that continues to complicate the calendar. If the selection of Qatar for 2022 forced the tournament to be moved to November and December to escape the desert heat, with the resulting disruption to player preparation, the 2026 edition will see the number of participants increase from the usual 32 to 48. Adding fuel to the fire.