The prevalence of injuries in recreational football players and their effect on the socio-economic factors

Abstract

Introduction: Recreational football is extremely common amongst the Maltese population. Such athletes are referred to ‘weekend-warriors’ as playing football is more of a hobby than a professional practice. The aim of this study is to find out the prevalence of injuries that occur during these recreational football games and the impact these injuries bear on established socio-economic factors. Method: An online questionnaire was constructed and distributed within an organised amateur football league. The questionnaire was used to subjectively assess the prevalence, location and type of injuries that have been sustained in the previous 12 months and how these injuries may have affected the participants in a social and economic manner. Results were analysed using SPSS. Results: 68.1% of the respondents claimed that they sustained an injury and knee injuries were the most common with 21.3%. Muscular injuries were the most recorded with 43.4%. An increase in occurrence and duration of recreational football matches have resulted to significantly increase the risk of an injury, while warm up and cool down did not show any significant difference when it comes to decreasing risk of an injury. Conclusion: Respondents older than 30 years of age have resulted to be the most socio-economically affected when an injury is sustained. Further research is required as studies regarding the prevalence of injury in recreational football is very scarce.