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FIFA allows five substitutions until 2021

FIFA allows five substitutions until 2021
FIFA allowed five substitutions per team until 2021, as it believes the pandemic will continue until next year.
by Academia   |   comments 0
Friday, July 17 2020

Aiming at the athletes' well-being during this difficult phase, FIFA announced that football will have five substitutions per team until 2021. Thus, competitions that will last until the middle of next year, can take advantage of this measure.

According to FIFA, football will have five substitutions aimed at improving the athletes' physical fitness. In addition, this decision had already been taken on May 8 and is already happening. But now the top football body has decided to extend that rule.

The Euro and the Olympics will probably need to use this measure, as they were postponed and will be played between July and August 2021. However, according to FIFA, this measure will be at the discretion of the competition organizers.

"The decision to apply this temporary amendment remains at the discretion of each competition organizer."

"The variable impact of the pandemic on football will be kept under constant review to ensure that appropriate actions are taken in the future in relation to this temporary change" says part of the agency's official note.

In addition, the rule of three breaks for substitutions is maintained. Thus, preventing the occurrence of several stoppages in the match, according to the entity.

“There are no changes to the details of the temporary change to the Laws of the Game, which will allow the use of a maximum of five substitutes per team. However, to avoid interruptions in the game, each team will only have three opportunities to make substitutions, although substitutions made at halftime are not counted as one of three opportunities.”