There will be Five Substitutions Allowed in the 2020/21 Season of the Champions League

Published on September 25th, 2020 10:35am EST


The UEFA Champions League is one of the most watched sports competitions in the world. However, with the COVID outbreak of 2020, certain adjustments had to be made for the rules of the game. One of these was to allow clubs 5 substitutions during the game, as opposed to the normal 3. The International Football Association Board (The IFAB) then confirmed that this rule would continue into the 2020-21 season.

This is one of the two major reforms that were put in place when the various competitions around Europe resumed, with the other being 2 breaks in between halves of the game. While this latter rule has been abandoned because it disrupted the game too much and was seen as unnecessary for this year's welfare of the players, the 5-sub rule has been upheld in many of the top competitions in Europe - except for England's Premier League.

In the Premier League, it was voted to scrap both the 5-sub rule and the water breaks, as many clubs argued that the 5-sub rule led to the top teams to only dominate more, as they had more quality on their benches. This was apparently considered a valid reason, so now English teams only can sub the standard 3 times in the Premier League. Those in the Champions League will be able to substitute 5 players.

An interesting aspect that will need to be considered is how the 3-sub rule will affect English performance in the European competition. With the now-compressed season and all the other top leagues adopting the 5-sub rule, it almost seems likely that the English teams will suffer more due to the higher degree of fatigue that this will likely cause.

Of course, that prediction could be completely wrong and an English team might dominate. We'll just have to wait and see.