There are some tired bodies and weary minds around the Premier League at this time. For some of them, this week represents a rare and much-needed midweek off for the first time in ages. Others don’t even get that.
Here, then, are the 10 Premier League outfield players to have racked up the most minutes this season. Goalkeepers don’t count, obviously, because they don’t get tired do they? But every minute played by everyone else in all competitions for club and country since the start of the season is fair game.
That obviously means a list dominated by the European teams, but that’s also kind of the point. Their lads are going to be the busiest and weariest.
10) Pedro Porro (Tottenham and Spain) – 3220 minutes
Has played a full 90 minutes in 20 of Tottenham’s 24 Premier League games this season, and played some part in all 24. Two of his ‘bit-part’ roles lasted 62 and 88 minutes.
Luckily for Pedro, that’s all he’s had to do. Oh, no, wait; we’re now hearing he’s also played six full Europa League games, two full FA Cup games, had three more appearances in the Carabao and three full games for Spain.
Luckily for Pedro, at least he doesn’t play for a team whose system requires all its players to cover absurd amounts of ground at absurd speed. Oh, no, wait; we’re now hearing he does play for just such a side.
Still, at least he doesn’t play at full-back, the position where those requirements to cover absurd amounts of ground at absurd speed are most exaggerated. Oh, no…well, you get the idea with that.
Of all the mad things that have happened this season – and not just at and to Spurs – ‘Pedro Porro Not Getting Injured’ is right up there, frankly.
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9) Youri Tielemans (Aston Villa and Belgium) – 3229 minutes
Having forced his way into Villa’s first-choice starting XI in the second half of last season, Tielemans has very much stayed there. To a frankly absurd degree.
Has already racked up more than 400 more minutes of Premier League football this season than he did last, and has started every single Villa game in the Premier League, Champions League and FA Cup. And in only two of those 34 games has he played less than 75 minutes.
Has also found time to squeeze in four Nations League games for Belgium and make a funny face at Lucas Bergvall.
8) Josko Gvardiol (Man City and Croatia) – 3346 minutes
Manchester City signed one of the best young centre-backs in the world and Pep Guardiola promptly turned him into a relentless goalscoring force of a left-back, which is a very good bit.
Has missed only one game out of 32 in the Premier League and Champions League this season and even got a run-out in both City’s Carabao games. Which seems a bit much.
Also ever-present across six games and three international breaks for Croatia, who foolishly still appear to consider him a centre-back.
7) Dejan Kulusevski (Tottenham and Sweden) – 3390 minutes
Now visibly and understandably exhausted having carried Spurs through autumn and winter largely single-handed. Somehow not yet injured after 45 appearances – more than anyone else on this list.
Has started all but two of Spurs’ Premier League games this season, and came off the bench in the other two. And one of those was on the opening weekend at Leicester.
But the clearest indicator of his importance to the impossible task of making Spurs look even halfway competent is in the cup competitions.
Ange Postecoglou has tried desperately to give his main man some sort of rest here, but with no joy. He started only two of Spurs’ Europa League games, but finished every single one, while the rest of Spurs’ damn fools couldn’t even be trusted to sort out Coventry in the Carabao or Tamworth in the FA Cup without Kulusevski having to come off the bench and sort it out for them.
Chuck in ever-present status through Sweden’s National League campaign across the autumn international breaks and you’ve got a very weary boy.
6) Gabriel Magalhaes (Arsenal and Brazil) – 3394 minutes
And he’d be even higher on this list had a knee injury not kept him out of two-and-a-half Premier League games and one in the Champions League.
He’s started and generally finished every other game in those two competitions, as well as playing every minute of the two-legged Carabao semi-final against Newcastle and all 120 minutes of Arsenal’s FA Cup campaign.
Has he also played every single minute of Brazil’s six World Cup qualifying games this season? You’d better believe he’s also played every single minute of Brazil’s six World Cup qualifying games this season.
5) Erling Haaland (Man City and Norway) – 3432 minutes
A man visibly in need of a rest when him and City were at the late-2024 worst, but a man for whom that rest would never come because City had decided, in their great wisdom, that when you have the Goalbot 3000 you don’t really need a Julian Alvarez. (Alvarez, for what it’s worth, has himself chalked up 3353 minutes in 50 appearances for club and country this season).
The nearest thing Haaland has had to a rest in this overworked season is either coming off for the last half-hour of the 6-0 win at Ipswich if you want to be kind about it, or the first half of the 5-1 defeat against Arsenal in which he infamously touched the ball six times if you want to be a dick about it.
We will choose, as we always will, the latter approach.
Has also had a couple of short rests at the end of a couple of City’s early Champions League games before it all got very fraught and has managed to rack up these huge numbers without dirtying his boots or dignity for a single second of FA Cup or Carabao action.
Also played almost every minute of Norway’s Nations League campaign, with the seven minutes of rest he was granted at the end of a 4-1 win over Slovenia and 5-0 win over Kazakhstan probably not recharging the ol’ batteries all that much really.
The ridiculous stats of Erling Haaland: 82 Premier League goals at 21 Premier League grounds
4) Diogo Dalot (Man United and Portugal) – 3456 minutes
Left-back, right-back, left wing-back, right wing-back. One side of the pitch or the other, in one United manager’s system or another, he’s been out there. United’s Mr Dependable.
Had he not cannily got himself 150 minutes of rest by getting sent off after an hour of the FA Cup clash at Arsenal, he’d be nudging towards top spot here.
What catches the eye with Dalot is that there is no respite. No competition where he is spared. He has started all 23 Premier League games for which he was available, started seven and played 45 minutes of the other one of United’s eight Europa League as well as at least an hour of all five of United’s games in the FA Cup and Carabao Cup. He even played 90 minutes in the Community Shield
In summary, then: the only United game in which he has not been involved at all was the one for which he was suspended. No wonder he got himself sent off just to get his trotters up for a bit.
Portugal are, at least, a bit more forgiving, allowing Dalot the rare luxury this season of watching an entire game from the bench against Scotland while still calling on him in all five of their other Nations League assignments.
3) Virgil van Dijk (Liverpool and Netherlands) – 3496 minutes
Hasn’t missed a single minute of Liverpool’s dominant Premier League season – we can assume he’d be another 90 minutes on had the Merseyside Derby not been postponed – and also played every minute of the seven Champions League league phase games that actually mattered.
Hadn’t been involved in the Carabao until the semi-finals but played both legs against Spurs. Has not and now will not get involved the FA Cup this season.
A red card against Hungary for two quick bookings late on in that game saved him a bit of Nations League work for Netherlands but still well over 300 minutes to chuck in the pot there.
2) William Saliba (Arsenal and France) – 3615 minutes
Truly extraordinary numbers for one of only two Premier League players to have gone beyond 3500 minutes, especially when you consider that Saliba missed two games completely through injury, was able to be rested for Arsenal’s final league phase game in the Champions League, and also saved himself 150 minutes of Premier League toil with that red card at Bournemouth that was, like all Arsenal red cards, entirely without controversy.
In part, this is the centre-back’s lot. They are so very rarely the players given a few minutes’ rest here and there at the end of games long won, or when the manager is looking to shake things up in the closing stages.
That Bournemouth sending-off is the only time all season where Saliba hasn’t played a full 90 minutes in any game he starts. And he starts an awful lot of games.
And you can add international duty to that as well, with five 90-minute appearances for France in the Nations League to also factor in here.
1) Bruno Fernandes (Man United and Portugal) – 3642 minutes
A couple of striking things about this Bruno effort.
Firstly, he’s clearly completely indispensable to Man United despite it not really being entirely clear Ruben Amorim knows precisely how best to use him in his system. He knows only that use him he must.
Secondly, it’s doubly impressive to have racked up more minutes than literally any other outfielder in the Premier League during a season where you’ve been sent off not once, not twice but thrice. Even with one of those being rescinded and thus not compounded by suspension, it’s some effort.
The final minutes at Porto and the ensuing suspension against Fenerbahce are the only minutes Bruno has missed in the Europa League this season, while he has started every Premier League game for which he wasn’t suspended. United lost 2-0 to Newcastle in his absence, and he was missed.
Of his 21 Premier League starts that have not been ended prematurely by the referee, Bruno has only three times failed to rack up the full 90. And still had a pretty full shift on those occasions, with 79 minutes at Brighton, 65 in the 4-0 win over Everton and 76 in the 3-2 defeat to Nottingham Forest.
Has played all 210 minutes of United’s already-exhausting FA Cup defence as well as full 90s in the Carabao against both Leicester and Tottenham. With a cool 540 minutes of Nations League action for Portugal thrown in for good measure.
By definition, there are few players on this list their teams can cope without, but few feel more important to the whole feel of their teams than Bruno and Man United. And that’s probably because of rather than despite the fact they still so often look quite ropey even when he is there.
