The effect of pre-match sexual intercourse on football players’ performance: a prospective cross over study

BACKGROUND: Current research suggests that pre-competition sexual intercourse does not influence athletes’ performance. Yet, high quality studies in this field are scarce. METHODS: We aimed to investigate whether sexual activity negatively influences physiological performance. We conducted a prospective cross over study, which enrolled active players from the first team of a football club in the Israeli Football Premier League during the 2018-19 season. We gathered participants’ physiological performance using GPS driven data per match. In addition, we assessed sexual activity the night before using telephone interviews at the end of every match. We used a linear mixed models methodology, accounting for each player as a cluster. RESULTS: We enrolled 14 participants who participated in 88 football matches. The mean age was 29.7 (±3.8) years and the majority were in permanent relationships for longer than 6 months (78.6%). We identified sexual intercourses the night before the match in 9 (10.2%) cases. The average speed during the match was slower when participants had pre-match intercourse (6.5 vs. 6.0 Km/h, P=0.02). The results remained consistent when using linear mixed models analysis adjusted for age, for previous belief that a pre-match sexual intercourse may affect match performance and for player as a cluster (P=0.02, 95% C.I -0.85- -0.07). Other parameters were not associated with pre-match intercourse. CONCLUSIONS: To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to show that sexual intercourse the night before a football match may have a negative influence on players’ performance.