OFFICIAL FOOTY THREAD ⚽️: Euro Cup and Copa America underway

Who wins the Euros?

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nomadicsole21 said:
Pep started Rico at midfield...Whole midfield playing with two left feet and we are getting exposed with our high line. Rodri and Rico the only ones that looked decent 1st half.
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I really like Rico in midfield tbh. RB whole attack is just fast dudes that’s the whole strat so against the high line we play against that always a chance to get caught out. I see saw the comeback tho. Love this team.
 
vintage hummels performance today and he was MOTM

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Belgium said:
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I wonder what kind of impact this will have on football (see article I linked below on the opioid Tramadol becoming a banned substance by January 1st 2024)
For reference, Tramadol is a moderately strong opioid that isn't quite as potent as Oxycodone or Hydrocodone but it's significantly stronger than Codeine. I don't know how common it is in the US, where it's apparently branded as Ultram.

In Belgium on the other hand, it is the opioid. If non-opioid painkillers are deemed insufficient, you'll be given Tramadol.
I've never seen or heard of codeine being prescribed for pain here, only in cough syrup.

I can actually give a little personal insight here, as I've been prescribed a daily dosage of 400mg (the maximum) for what is probably around 7-8 years now.
Doctors couldn't and still can't figure out the cause of severe chronic pain in my calves that appeared after my partial lung removal surgery, along with the onset of my hormone condition. I of course tried every non-opioid form of pain relief doctors could come up with, including obscure ones like Lyrica, but was eventually given Tramadol to make the pain bearable.

This stuff is no joke and it didn't take long for me to start rampantly abusing my prescriptions for the last 7 years or so. I tried tapering down a couple times from 400mg but each time I couldn't make it past 325mg without being forced to give up due to the pain in my calves. The last 5 years or so have essentially been a non-stop continuing abuse of my prescriptions far past 400mg, at some points up to 800mg by crushing up 2 extra 200mg Extended Release pills. Being an addict was something I kept to myself and only shared with my friends after meeting a fellow addict (cocaine in her case) and becoming mutual best friends. My circle of friends were pretty shocked when I told them, besides one who said he expected it due to the nature of opioids but never noticed anything off about me. Neither do my employers I suppose, as I was abusing a dosage of around 800mg during my job interview, so in theory it's perfectly possible to be a high-functioning addict for years.

Putting Tramadol on the ban list was announced a little over a year in advance so players had time to quit their addiction. As someone who has had to taper down from extremely high dosages numerous times (including currently), you really only have 1 if you want to keep your addiction hidden and continue functioning in society.
Cold turkey is not only virtually impossible, you will not be able to function or do anything at all for the entire duration. The other method is to taper down, but this again limits your functioning. Even something that seems minimal, like tapering down 50mg at a time, will cause severe withdrawal symptoms such as flu-like symptoms and worst of all an uncontrollable impulse to move your arm or hands, as well as the feeling of your brain getting overloaded.
Also take in mind that 400mg is the maximum dosage on paper, but addicts are likely to use up to 800mg a day due to gradually increased tolerance.

There is a way to taper down slowly with almost no withdrawal effects but it involves the use of either a weaker opioid like codeine (like the methadone treatment for heroin), and/or the use of a drug called Kratom that I assume to already be on WADA's ban list. I know Kratom is legal in the Netherlands but it's illegal in Belgium.
Kratom is technically not an opioid but it binds to the same opioid receptors in your brain, which basically tricks your brain into thinking you ingested an opioid and thus it strongly reduces withdrawal effects.

My personal taper down method is a combination of these two methods. I decrease my Tramadol dosage by 100mg at once, and fully relieve the withdrawal effects with a combination of Codeine syrup and Kratom. After getting back down to 400mg (usually from ~800mg), it's just a matter of tapering down the supplementary Codeine. Much like the methadone-heroin method, codeine is much less difficult to taper down to 0 than Tramadol. Quitting the codeine is just a matter of relieving the withdrawal with Kratom. You can then quit the Kratom immediately without any adverse effects.
This is a very slow process however, at least if you want to fully relieve any withdrawal effects along the way. I've found that tapering down by 100mg takes around 4 to 5 weeks, though I'm sure it can be shortened somewhat if you're willing to endure some degree of withdrawal effects.

As far as whether Tramadol truly belongs on the list of banned substances for footballers, I don't think it gives you an advantage. More specifically, for footballers I think the negative impact on cognitive functions would be a bigger disadvantage than the advantage you get from pain relief.
If you're not a regular opioid user, you'll experience intense euphoria. If you're an addict, your head won't quite be in the clouds due to tolerance but it's still a negative impact on your cognitive functions. Reaction time, quick thinking, staying focused, ...


https://web.archive.org/web/2023111...023/11/14/tramadol-football-banned-drug-wada/
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jking0821 said:
Pretty sure it is know that Tramadol was being given out like candy in the NFL. I don't know if they cut back but there were players who retired who would talk about basically taking it before and during every game due to constantly being injured. It is why the ban on weed in the NFL seems so stupid because some players would rather smoke to relax and help with pain then take opioids but it seems like the NFL would rather they not
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I believe it was Toradol, I know it was mentioned in the Hernandez doc. I think it was banned or they were going to ban it. It’s a non-opioid analgesic. Works great, it’s an NSAID but it’s really for short term use because it can impair your renal function. You’re supposed to use it for like a week at most but teams were giving it to their players for weeks. My favorite non-opioid to give to patients after ketamine.
noskey said:
Tramadol is very popular in the states, or at least the NW. Unsure how popular it is for abuse but it's prescribed like crazy
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Crazy story Belgium Belgium glad you were open to share it. Don’t really hear about opioid issues in other countries.
Here, at least in the hospitals, mainly in the North East, tramadol is more often given to elderly patients who can’t really tolerate stronger opioids. But we typically administer oxy, Percocet and or Vicodin. There are other tablet forms of opioids but they aren’t as common. Opiate addiction is still very much a problem, especially with fentanyl being pressed into them. But you really don’t hear about people being addicted to tramadol but I’m sure it does happen. I never heard of kratom. I don’t think we use it here
 
mastamind89 said:
I believe it was Toradol, I know it was mentioned in the Hernandez doc. I think it was banned or they were going to ban it. It’s a non-opioid analgesic. Works great, it’s an NSAID but it’s really for short term use because it can impair your renal function. You’re supposed to use it for like a week at most but teams were giving it to their players for weeks. My favorite non-opioid to give to patients after ketamine.


Crazy story Belgium Belgium glad you were open to share it. Don’t really hear about opioid issues in other countries.
Here, at least in the hospitals, mainly in the North East, tramadol is more often given to elderly patients who can’t really tolerate stronger opioids. But we typically administer oxy, Percocet and or Vicodin. There are other tablet forms of opioids but they aren’t as common. Opiate addiction is still very much a problem, especially with fentanyl being pressed into them. But you really don’t hear about people being addicted to tramadol but I’m sure it does happen. I never heard of kratom. I don’t think we use it here
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You’re right about that. They give it too much up here and it does nothing.

I think it sucks. They gave me tramadol last time I had a kidney stone and it did nothing.
 
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