An Analysis Safe Protocols Employed in Professional Male Soccer and the Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the 2020 Brazilian Championship

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Hello,

Thank you for your submission of the manuscript “An Analysis of Covid-19 Safe Protocols Employed in Professional Male Soccer and the Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the 2020 Brazilian Championship” to the journal Sustainability. An analysis of Covid-19 protocols across professional sport organizations is both timely and warranted, as it provides insight into the reactions among associations to protecting the health and safety of players and allows for an analysis of best practices for associations to consider in potential future global pandemic environments. Overall, the analysis of this topic was well presented, with a robust sample of soccer association Covid-19 protocols collected and analyzed. The presentation of results was comprehensive, and the tables/figures used in the manuscript helped visualize key data presented.

There were several areas within the manuscript that should receive editing and further development before this paper can be accepted for publication in Sustainability. The following is a list of items to consider as you look to revise and resubmit this manuscript.

General Feedback

The authors used several terms for this virus, including “Covid-19,” “COVID-19,” and “SARS-Cov-2.” I suggest standardizing the language used for this throughout the manuscript.

There are numerous minor grammatical issues and errors throughout the document. Some of these are called out in the feedback provided below, but there is a need to go through the entire document and clean up grammar errors, including misused words and punctuation errors.

Abstract

L17: Remove the words “reached and” and “upon” so that this sentence reads: “The Covid-19 pandemic directly impacted elite sports and caused the postponement of sporting events globally.”

Introduction

Overall, this was a well-structured Introduction leading to a logical purpose statement for this research. There are a few minor suggestions for edits listed below, but in general, the Introduction flows well and presents good justification for this research.

L37-38: “The coronavirus was not the first to infect and spread amongst humans.” Did you mean to say this was not the first pandemic to infect and spread amongst humans? Please check this.

L44-47: This reads as an incomplete sentence and/or a period was used rather than a comma in L47. Please check and revise

L52-55: Among the restrictions imposed during the pandemic should include mask requirements. I suggest adding this to the list of restrictions mentioned here.

Materials and Methods

The main issue with this section is no criteria was presented for how these 15 protocols were chosen. There should be some discussion about how the authors decided to use these specific protocols within their research. Of course, the CBF protocol is understandable given the title of this research. However, what criteria lead to the selection of the other protocols used for comparison?

L129-131: It was a bit confusing to read through this to determine how the number of infected individuals was determined. I suggest rewriting this sentence and simplifying this verbiage for the reader. Additionally, I would recommend substituting the word “competing” for “disputing” in this sentence.

Results

I would suggest adding subheadings to organize this section into two main subsections: 1) Comparison of Covid Protocols; 2) Covid-19 Infections During the 2020 Brazilian Championship. Or something of this nature.

For the paragraphs comparing Covid protocols (essentially L182-249), I suggest reorganizing the information in these paragraphs so that they begin with a description of how the CBF protocol handled the issue, followed by discussion on how other soccer federation protocols had similar or different protocols compared to the CBF. Given the title and purpose of this research, this would help these sections keep a focus on protocol comparison between CBF and other federations. Right now, the CBF protocol language gets lost in the shuffle in some of these paragraphs as that information is buried in the middle of the paragraph.

There is a need to be consistent with the terminology used for each soccer association. For example, the United States Soccer Federation is referred to as both the “Federation of the United States” (L205-206) and the “United States Football Federation” (L224). Be consistent with terminology used for each soccer association discussed in this manuscript.

The term “outbreak” is used consistently in this section. However, there is no criteria specified for what constitutes an “outbreak.” What criteria were used to specify these 14 distinct outbreaks discussed in this section?

When discussing the geographic dispersion of teams in the Brazilian Series A (L149-151) a graphic showing where teams are located throughout Brazil would be helpful to add.

L147: Suggest replacing “highest score” with “highest point total.” Also, do all series (A, B, C, and D) contain 38 matches, or just Series A? Right now, this reads as all series containing 38 matches. Please clarify

L152-153: “usually involve travel by air and/or land.” I assume all matches require at least some travel by air and/or land for the visiting club. Therefore, I suggest the removal of the term “usually.”

L154-157: There is a need for citations to be included for the information presented in these sentences.

L158-159: Please clarify if this data refers to raw numbers of infections and deaths or infections and deaths per 100,000 inhabitants.

L159-162: There is a need for citations to be included for the information presented in these sentences.

L169-181: I would suggest moving this information to the Materials and Methods section and describing the criteria used for the selection of these protocols used for analysis in this study.

L196: “tests should be performed 72 hours” Should this read “tests should be performed 72 hours before games”?

L221-222: “present in many of the had protocols” Please correct the grammar here to clarify what is being said.

L249: “provisions for arbitration of this” It is unclear to me what this means. Please revise this sentence to clarify.

L275-276: Are these percentages referring to all players/coaches, or just those players/coaches that had an initial infection? Please clarify.

L283: Is “44” at the end of that sentence meant to be in brackets to identify a citation?

L302: Please identify WHO as World Health Organization before using the acronym.

L317: “less more than 13 fit and healthy players” Delete the word “less” from this sentence.

L328-331: I suggest changing the order of Figure 2 graphics A and B and adding in an additional paragraph that discusses the data in these figures. For example, you may want to comment on any relationships between spikes in outbreaks among teams (A) with upward trends in Covid-19 infections within Brazilian society (B).

Discussion

In general, I feel like more could be done in this section to highlight the best practices found in Covid-19 protocols reviewed in this study. This is done to some extent in L370-411, but there could be better organization of this best practices information. I would suggest a table that outlines best practices by topic area, utilizing those topic areas presented in Table 1.

I would also suggest some discussion toward the end of this section regarding how these best practices could be implemented by CBF in future pandemic situations. For example, if a best practice is to stage all matches in one stadium to eliminate travel for teams, where would be the best place for this to occur within Brazil?

L335: Replace the word “considered” with “considering”

L344: “can be is high” delete the word “is”

L362: “determines” does not feel like the correct word to use in this sentence. I suggest replacing with a different word.

L389-390: There is a need for a citation for the statement regarding ideal sample collection time for asymptomatic patients

L409: “The on 3 flights” Please clean up grammar error here.

L412: “Applying these findings in contexts likely to soccer” I believe you are trying to say “Applying these findings in contexts like soccer.”

Author Response

Dear Reviewer, 

The authors realised the modifications requested by the 3 reports. 

Kind regards,

The authors. 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Reading suggestion:

Introduction: COVID-19 and the soccer world - https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14660970.2020.1846117

Resuming professional football (soccer) during the COVID-19 pandemic in a country with high infection rates: a prospective cohort study - https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/55/19/1092

Good work

Best regards

Author Response

Dear Reviewer, 

The authors realised the modifications requested by the 3 reports. 

Kind regards,

The authors. 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

The paper is original and relevant. It is clearly written. The introduction is reasonable given the premise of the paper. The results are thorough. Figures and tables are comprehensive and helpful.

I have some minor suggestions:

1. The author introduced COVID-19 in the first paragraph of the introduction, then, used SARS-CoV-2 in the second paragraph. I suggest a brief notion that links SARS-CoV-2 to COVID-19 to avoid confusion to the reader.
2. Some wording suggestions

Line 139 ‘from’ instead of ‘by’

Line 147 consider revising the sentence

Line 170 ‘in’ is not consistent with the sentence

Line 191 before the start (of what?)

Line 222 ‘had’ is not consistent with the sentence

Line 268 there need to be one bracket instead of two

Line 317 ‘less more’ is not clear

3. Line 442 the policy of the three Ts: Test, Trace and Treatment is not explained in the conclusion either in the introduction part. I suggest a brief explanation of this policy.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer, 

The authors realised the modifications requested by the 3 reports. 

Kind regards,

The authors. 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx