How much does a Head of Fitness make?

andersj

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https://www.thisisanfield.com/2024/...s-to-depart-this-summer-after-8-years-at-lfc/

«Last year, Liverpool struggled to do so. Over the course of 63 matches - one every 4.5 days on average - the squad was ravaged by injuries to key players, with muscle injuries - and hamstrings in particular, leading to Klopp famously dubbing it the "shit word of the day" - cropping up at regular intervals.»

(…)

«First of all he’s an absolute mastermind in all the things he has to do for us. He’s an experienced guy who has worked together with the best teachers and the best players.

"Education and experience are the most important things in this job and he combines these two things in the perfect way. He fits together perfectly in our coaching team.»

https://liverpooloffside.sbnation.c...praises-mastermind-kornmayer-fitness-injuries

I also remember Klopp raving about him when they signed him talking about how impressed he always was about the physical condition of the Bayern-players. Liverpool have had a fair amount of injuries lately, but they also play with extreme intensity. And players like Salah, Mane, Firmino, van Dijk, Robertson played almost every game for years.

Maybe the Liverpool-link makes it impossible, but you would think it is a question about money? Maybe Ineos hire them as consultants? I would assume it is about an approach and method.
 
Nothing like as much as they should. My friend was a physio for an F1 team and one of her uni friends was head of fitness (for want of a better word) for a PL team that’s now in The Championship. They didn’t make more than £100k.

I can’t imagine anyone is clearing £250k, but even if it was £500k with another £1m bonus for reducing injury days by Xdays, it’d be more than worth it.

It’s all well and good having a playing squad costing half a billion and a wage bill that rivals the size of a small state. But player availability is as important as coaching (assuming you’ve built a viable squad).

Arsenal have managed to challenge this year with nothing like the squad that City have. Purely because they have most of their players available every week. It’s not by accident. They spend more time working on shape than other aspects of fitness. They’ve reduced on the grass time and replaced it with more classroom time.

All opinion from this point on, but I think Arteta allows the player welfare team to dictate training volume and intensity in the same way the set piece team makes all decisions in that space.

Balance points everywhere but using United as an example, the sheer volume of injuries we suffer BETWEEN matches is ridiculous. We regular witness a player finish a match looking mobile, then injure themselves in training. Something’s off there.
 
UnrelatedPsuedo said:
Nothing like as much as they should. My friend was a physio for an F1 team and one of her uni friends was head of fitness (for want of a better word) for a PL team that’s now in The Championship. They didn’t make more than £100k.

I can’t imagine anyone is clearing £250k, but even if it was £500k with another £1m bonus for reducing injury days by Xdays, it’d be more than worth it.

It’s all well and good having a playing squad costing half a billion and a wage bill that rivals the size of a small state. But player availability is as important as coaching (assuming you’ve built a viable squad).

Arsenal have managed to challenge this year with nothing like the squad that City have. Purely because they have most of their players available every week. It’s not by accident. They spend more time working on shape than other aspects of fitness. They’ve reduced on the grass time and replaced it with more classroom time.

All opinion from this point on, but I think Arteta allows the player welfare team to dictate training volume and intensity in the same way the set piece team makes all decisions in that space.

Balance points everywhere but using United as an example, the sheer volume of injuries we suffer BETWEEN matches is ridiculous. We regular witness a player finish a match looking mobile, then injure themselves in training. Something’s off there.
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Great point. We should be hiring the best in class for them and offering the best salary possible. When you factor in the £££ we've wasted on players wages who are unavailable.
 
UnrelatedPsuedo said:
Nothing like as much as they should. My friend was a physio for an F1 team and one of her uni friends was head of fitness (for want of a better word) for a PL team that’s now in The Championship. They didn’t make more than £100k.

I can’t imagine anyone is clearing £250k, but even if it was £500k with another £1m bonus for reducing injury days by Xdays, it’d be more than worth it.

It’s all well and good having a playing squad costing half a billion and a wage bill that rivals the size of a small state. But player availability is as important as coaching (assuming you’ve built a viable squad).

Arsenal have managed to challenge this year with nothing like the squad that City have. Purely because they have most of their players available every week. It’s not by accident. They spend more time working on shape than other aspects of fitness. They’ve reduced on the grass time and replaced it with more classroom time.

All opinion from this point on, but I think Arteta allows the player welfare team to dictate training volume and intensity in the same way the set piece team makes all decisions in that space.

Balance points everywhere but using United as an example, the sheer volume of injuries we suffer BETWEEN matches is ridiculous. We regular witness a player finish a match looking mobile, then injure themselves in training. Something’s off there.
Click to expand...

Actually, Arsenal have had more injuries than City. The reason they’ve coped is because they have a bigger squad than City, who have one of the smaller squads in the league. In terms of fitness/injury prevention it’s City that should be the gold standard, not Arsenal.
 
Not a huge amount. I have two friends in it, one is Head of Fitness and another is Head Physio, both for different European clubs. The physio is on a bit under 100k and the fitness coach a fair bit less, and both want to move to the Premier League but the drop in salary they'd have to take makes it too tough to swallow.
 
My guess is somewhere between 100k-200k.

I recall Mourinho's assistance team was around 4m annual package when sacked by Chelsea 2nd time, the entire team. His #2 was probably on 500K-1m, so the rest of the team (fitness trainer, analyst, keeper coach etc.) would be 100-200K.

Arsenal's set piece coach, at whatever pay cheque, we should poach him with double his current pay.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
Actually, Arsenal have had more injuries than City. The reason they’ve coped is because they have a bigger squad than City, who have one of the smaller squads in the league. In terms of fitness/injury prevention it’s City that should be the gold standard, not Arsenal.
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Nah. Narrative attached to Data. Remove Timbers injury from Arsenal (fair because he’s never kicked a ball for them in earnest) and they’ve had less days of injury. I *think* Partey was declared injured for a long while too, but perhaps not in that data.

But fair with me being lazy. I guess the less lazy point is that Arsenal have had most of their starting 11 fit, for almost the whole season. Raya, White, Saliba, Gabriel, Rice, Odegard, Saka and Havertz have been close to ever present. Their one problem injury was Martinelli and Trossard is a close to equal replacement. I’m sure some of it is luck. But their core Starting players have stayed fit.

City may have a numerically smaller squad, but Arsenal’s drop off from first 11 to their replacements is massive in most positions. City’s, not so much.

Not to say you’re wrong. Not arguing about facts, but there’s a lot of nuance there.
 
Bwuk said:
Great point. We should be hiring the best in class for them and offering the best salary possible. When you factor in the £££ we've wasted on players wages who are unavailable.
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Only problem you run into is incentivising players being declared fit. But that’s disincentivised by the fact they’ll fall apart if not fit.
 
If we hire someone who's been in charge of this stuff at Liverpool for 8 years, do we think all our players will suddenly develop asthma and then we'll oddly be fitter than machines one season and then look like our legs are utterly gone the next?
 
I have friends and former classmates in that field(Handball and Rugby) and from memory it was anywhere between 3k-6k per month, physio between 2k-4k per month. Though I don't know how much it would in the genuinely wealthy clubs.
 
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