No Increased Injury Risk on Artificial Turf in Finnish Premier Division Football.

Abstract

Objective: To compare the injury risk between natural grass and artificial turf in the male Finnish premier division (Veikkausliiga) matches during the 2019 league season.

Design: A retrospective reanalysis of prospectively collected season-long injury surveillance cohort study.

Setting: Finnish elite-level male football.

Participants: All 12 teams of Veikkausliiga participated in the study. All players were eligible to participate. Two hundred thirty-six players took part in the follow-up between February and November 2019.

Interventions: Matches were played between April and November 2019. Injury data were collected using standard injury reports from the team medicals and weekly player questionnaires. Individual player exposure in matches was collected. Artificial turf was classified as exposure and natural grass as control in the analyses.

Main outcome measures: Match-related injury incidence and incidence rate ratios (IRR) with 95% confidence intervals (CI) on natural grass and artificial turf.

Results: A total of 113 injuries (65 on artificial turf, 48 on natural grass) in 167 matches (90 on artificial turf, 77 on natural grass) were included. Injury incidence was 27.2/1000 hours on artificial turf and 23.9/1000 hours on natural grass and (IRR, 1.1; 95% CI, 0.8-1.7). There was no difference in injury types, anatomical regions, injury recurrence, injury severity, or injury contact. Forwards may have had an increased injury incidence on artificial turf compared with natural grass (IRR, 3.4; 95% CI, 1.0-11.8).

Conclusions: This study supports previous reports that there is no significant increase in the overall risk of injury in professional football played on artificial turf compared with that on natural grass.