Team athlete fitness: play the game or perform intervals?

Which is best for developing fitness in team-sport athletes: high-intensity intervals or small-sided games? SPB looks at new research

In recent years, the use of high-intensity interval training (HIIT) has become an increasingly popular training mode among athletes, and with good reason. Not only is it an excellent tool for developing and sharpening cardiovascular fitness, these benefits can be had for a relatively small investment in training time, making it a highly efficient training mode. For example, research has shown that 7 x 30-second sprint intervals can be just as effective at increasing key markers of aerobic fitness as 3 x 20-minute hard efforts, despite an 8-times greater training volume and 17-times longer training duration in the 20-minute intervals⁽¹⁾! (For a more in-depth discussion on HIIT for fitness gains, see these articles.)

HIIT in team sport athletes

It turns out that HIIT is not just useful for endurance athletes seeking to ‘sharpen up’ race fitness; this training mode is potentially also well suited to team sport players such as soccer and rugby. In a paper by Buchheit titled ‘Managing high-speed running load in professional soccer players: the benefit of high-intensity interval training supplementation’, the data presented shows that the distance run at a high-intensity in professional soccer is not insignificant⁽²⁾. For example, elite outfield players in the English Premiership typically run in excess of one kilometre (1,100 yards) at a high-intensity (over 19.8 kmh/12.3mph) during a game. This is important since the distance covered performing high-intensity running is a reliable indicator of a player’s performance capability, even though high-speed running constitutes a relatively small proportion of a player’s activity during a match compared to walking and jogging. The importance of high-speed running capacity is evidenced by the fact that:

• During the second half of a game, the volume of high-intensity running can be 35 to 45% less than in the first half without a reduction in low intensity running.
• Elite soccer players run further at a high-intensity during a game than moderate standard players.
• It is during high-intensity periods of play that the outcome of a game is often decided.

For these reasons, some exercise physiologists have argued that structure of team-sport training should be designed to improve a player’s capability to perform intermittent high-intensity exercise – with HIIT sessions – in theory at least - being a great way to do this – see figure 1 for an actual example.

---

Figure 1: High-speed running distance covered during training and matches with and without HIIT⁽²⁾

Upper panel = training, matches without supplementary HIIT); lower panel with added HIIT. Data is for a midfielder playing in a 1st division club during a 5-week in-season period. Notice how with addition of HIIT (red bars) simulate the exertion intensities of matches. Notice too how the acute to chronic workload (yellow trace) spikes (thereby increasing fatigue and injury risk) after an intense training period where no HIIT was taking place, but remained manageable when HIIT was added.

---

Small-sided games option

HIIT is not the only tool that can be used to develop team-sport fitness. Small-sided games (SSGs) – eg five-a-side in soccer and seven-a-side in rugby are also very popular tools among coaches. Studies show that fewer players and larger pitch sizes (ie higher individual playing area per player) tend to increase the heart rate responses, blood lactate concentrations, and/or rate of perceived exertion of players from different age groups and competitive levels^(3,4). Crucially, in terms of physical demands, consistent findings suggest that SSGs increase the distances covered at high-speed zones, especially when played on larger pitches⁽⁵⁾. And unlike sessions of HIIT, the use of SSGs simultaneously develops the players’ tactical and technical skills required for the sport, making them a very time-efficient method of training.

Given the above, the use of SSGs has become a very popular of incorporating high-intensity training into team-sport programs. Certainly, research on SSGs shows that this mode of training has a real and positive impact on players’ levels of aerobic fitness⁽⁶⁾ - benefits that match those induced by HIIT⁽⁷⁾. For this reason, the use of HIIT in soccer and rugby training is undoubtedly less popular than SSGs. However, should HIIT be completely dismissed by players and coaches?

A rounded team sport player on the field needs to have a range of qualities such as good sprint capacity and excellent explosive abilities (eg jumping, changing direction, accelerating, and decelerating). Any mode of training should therefore try to develop all of these as improvement in sprinting time (ST) and change of direction time (CODt) may ensure a quicker capacity to overcome the opposing team, while a good vertical height jump (VHJ) may help players to reach higher balls while providing information about lower limb explosive power. It turns out that to date, no dedicated analysis comparing the use of HIIT and SSGs – in particular, the effects of SSG-based and running-based HIIT programs in soccer on ST, CODt, and VHJ – has been carried out. However, brand new research has sought to answer this question and come up with some fascinating results⁽⁸⁾.

HIIT vs. SSGs

In this study, which was published in the journal Frontiers of Physiology, researchers carried out a meta-analysis of the existing literature on this topic by pooling the data from previous high-quality studies that has investigated the use of HIIT and/or SSGs on the development of key determinants of soccer performance - namely sprint performance, change of direction/acceleration/deceleration ability and vertical jump height (crucial for gaining possession when the ball is in the air). Out of 650 studies screened in total, six were of high enough quality to be included in the final analysis and undergo rigorous statistical analysis. When the pooled data was finally analysed, the key results were as follows:

• Running-based HIIT interventions produced significantly greater benefits in sprinting performance compared to SSG interventions.
• Neither running-based HIIT nor SSG interventions produced significant benefits in vertical jump performance.
• SSG interventions produced no meaningful benefits in any of the outcomes – ie not in sprinting performance, vertical jump performance or change-of-direction performance.

Implications for team-sport athletes and coaches

The key finding was that running-based HIIT was significantly better than SSGs in terms of improving linear sprinting performance. This suggests that, despite the apparent positive aspects of SSGs (improved endurance capacity and the simultaneous development of sport-specific skills and tactics), the capacity of SSGs to enhance different physical qualities in soccer is limited (as is true of any training method). But this doesn’t mean that coaches and players should not use SSGs as part of a training program – far from it. Rather, SSGs could and should be used in combination with other approaches.

For example, combining SSGs and running-based HIIT sessions could be beneficial to soccer players - an approach that seems to be validated by previous research^(9,10). Additionally, a combination of SSGs with strength/power training (which improves sprint and vertical jump performance) could represent an interesting solution, and again, this is an approach for which appears to be validated in the literature⁽¹¹⁾. For players and coaches using SSGs alone, who can HIIT sessions and strength/power training be incorporated into a program? For further reading, readers are directed to this article on HIIT and this article on strength training for athletes.

References

1. Eur J Appl Physiol. 2010 Oct;110(3):597-606
2. 'Managing high-speed running load in professional soccer players' SPSR 2019 March (53) volume 1
3. J. Perform. Anal. Sport 18, 693–749
4. J. Sports Sci. 2019 37, 921–949
5. Res Sports Med. 2019 Jan-Mar; 27(1):50-59
6. Sports Med Phys Fitness. 2018 Oct; 58(10):1446-1455
7. Sports Med. 2019 May; 49(5):731-742
8. Front Physiol. 2021. March 12: 642703
9. Int J Sports Med. 2015 Nov; 36(11):929-34.
10. Hum Kinet. 2019 Oct; 69:249-257
11. J Sports Med Phys Fitness. 2020 Jan; 60(1):1-10