A Systematic Review of Football Studies in Exercise Physiology Challenges and Opportunities

This study has systematically reviewed all studies in exercise physiology in the field of football. For this purpose, by searching articles and theses on base of relevant keywords in databases such as IRANDOC, SID, NOORMAGES, MAGIRAN and SSRC web, All studies that were done in universities, research and executive organizations in the field of football were extracted and were studied by classifying them in different fields of exercise physiology. Then, the information was interpreted by using descriptive statistical methods in the form of tables and graphs. More than 1000 studies in different fields of football have been conducted in Iran till 1396 that 25% (256 title) of is in the field of exercise physiology. Approximately 56% of studies in training science, 23% in the nutrition and biochemistry, 13% in exercise immunology, 6.5% in the cardiovascular system and 1.5% in the nerve and muscle have been conducted. In the years between 85 to 95, there has been a lot of growth in the number of studies on exercise physiology that is, of course, related to increased enroll of student in these years at universities. Universities have the largest share in the production of soccer science. Then research Institute of Physical Education and sport science, Youth and Sports Ministry and IRIB have had financial support for football projects. There are many research opportunities in each of the fields that the researchers can help to progress of football in the country by researching on those issues. There are methodological problems to some researches; For example, it can be noted that the lack of measurement of metabolites when taking supplements, no use of similar anaerobic and aerobic tests and valid FIFAs and inappropriate timing of the measurement of blood parameters. Also, less attention has been paid to circumference, size and limp ratio, physical fitness standard norms, cellular and humoral immunity in different weather conditions and specific football drills during competition season.