This study aims to explore the specific muscle injury types, nature of match injury frequency and match incidence of the European top five football leagues (UEFA, 2023), to compare match hamstring injury severity characteristics and to study differences in match injury, frequency and incidence between the five leagues during the season 2022/2023. The sample size was N= 2678 (SD ± 41.8) male players from the “Big Five” European professional football leagues with a mean age of 26.7 (SD ± 4.6) years and an
average of 1303 minutes played per player with an average of a 27-player squad. A total number of 630 hamstring match injuries was recorded among the 98 clubs. Most of the injuries (N=298) required a two to four-week absence from football. The total playing exposure hours per league was 11,640.48, (SD ± 124.5). The severe injury patterns severe injuries represent 28.6% of the total of all severity patterns, indicating an extremely high hamstring injury burden.
Keywords: football, injury, incidence, muscle.
