Edinburgh Napier University

  INTRODUCTION:
Futsal or five-a-side indoor soccer is an ever-increasing in popularity team sport. Currently, studies focusing on the effects of playing position in futsal are limited let alone combining different playing position and measurement of inflammatory and antioxidant responses. Therefore, the aim of the current study was to investigate the effects of playing position on the time-course effects of a futsal match on oxidative stress, muscle damage markers, as well as inflammatory and antioxidant responses.
METHODS:
Sixty-two futsal players recruited in total and randomly allocated to four groups: control group (n=16, 23.6±0.7yrs, body mass Index (BMI) 23.7±0.0), wingers (n=18, 23.1±0.5yrs, BMI 23.4±0.0), defenders (n=16, 22.4±0.4yrs, BMI 23.8±0.1) and pivots (n=12, 24.1±0.5yrs, BMI 23.9±0.0). The following variables were measured before, immediately after, and 24h, 48h, 72h, 96h, 120h, and 144h post-match: creatine kinase (CK), lactate heydrogenase (LDH), interleukine-6, (IL-6), tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-a), complete white blood cells (WBC), c-reactive protein (CRP), Fibrinogen (FIB), soluble vascular cell adhesion molecule-1 (sVCAM-1), sP-Selectine, thiobarnituric acid reactive substances (TBARS), protein carbonyls (PC), Uric Acid (UA), oxidised glutathione (GSSG), catalase (CAT). A two-way mixed ANOVA was used for all dependent variables. A statistical level of p<0.05 was accepted and all descriptive data are expressed as mean ± SEM.
RESULTS:
CK and plasma LDH peaked at 24h and remained elevated for 144h and 96h respectively in all active groups. LDH remained elevated for 120h in defenders and 144h in wingers. IL-6 and TNF-a peaked immediately after and returned to baseline at 24h in all groups apart from wingers where IL-6 returned to baseline levels at 48h. WBC count peaked immediately after and returned to baseline at 48h in defenders and pivots and at 96h in wingers respectively. CRP and fibrinogen peaked at 24h and returned to baseline at 72h in most groups. Wingers CRP and FIB returned to baseline at 96h, whereas pivots FIB returned to baseline at 48h. sVCAM-1 peaked at 24h and returned to baseline at 72h in all groups, whereas sP-Selectine peaked immediately after and returned to baseline at 72h apart from the wingers group that returned to baseline levels at 96h. Both TBARS and PC peaked at 24h and retuned to baseline levels at 120h post-match. GSSG peaked at 24h and returned to baseline at 96h in all groups whereas CAT peaked immediately after and returned to baseline at 48h post-match. UA peaked at 24h and remained elevated 120h for Wingers and defenders and 96h post-match for pivots respectively.
CONCLUSION:
Immediate and short-term changes are induced by a single futsal match on oxidative, inflammatory, muscle damage and antioxidant markers. These changes are playing position dependent since particularly wingers indicated different responses in several markers. The current evidence can inform training practice in terms of recovery for different playing position in male futsal players.