Top clubs look for edge in their players’ DNA

Two Premier League clubs have commissioned genetic profiles of their players to identify their strengths and potential weaknesses, it can be revealed.

The clubs signed a deal this season with a personal genetics company to provide DNA profiles of both senior and academy players.

The profiles, obtained via a simple mouth swab, disclose the players’ balance of speed and endurance genes, whether they have injury-prone genes and the best nutrition to fit their DNA. The company, DNAFit, is also working with a leading European team but insists all three clubs’ identities must remain confidential.

The company has confirmed however, that it is working with Britain’s 800m runner Jenny Meadows, a bronze medallist at the 2009 world championships and 2011 European indoor champion.

The whole issue of genes in sport has become controversial after the World Anti-Doping Agency banned gene doping. But Keith Grimaldi, DNAFit’s chief scientific officer, said the profiles merely enable experts to identify certain genes which make athletes prone to specific injuries, the right kind of nutrition for individual sports people, and to provide an exact breakdown of their proportion of ‘power’ or ‘endurance’ genes.

Grimaldi said, however, that there was no ‘Lionel Messi gene’ identifiable which suggested a person had a talent for football.

He said: “We are not going to turn a fourth division footballer into a Premiership player but it is going to make small but important differences which could make an impact long term. When the England team go to Brazil we could know in advance who has a very high risk of sunstroke or sunburn, who has a very low risk, and who is in between. That is useful information and it is far better to know it than not.

“We believe the profiling can help with personalising the training — we look at about 15 genes associated with power and endurance and we see very wide range among footballers.

“Some are fast over short distances while an endurance footballer is able to cover every blade on the pitch. That may be obvious anyway, but it can help tailor training for the individual player.

“Genetic profiling is also is useful to identify those with a higher than average injury risk — there is a genetic component to tendon injuries and training regimes can counter this.”

In the area of nutrition, Grimaldi said DNA profiling had been able to help some footballers who struggle to lose weight because they have a gene which affects the absorption of fats.

Meadows, 32, is using the DNA information in her training but said she wished she had had the benefit of a genetic profile at the start of her career.

The athlete has discovered she has the gene that makes her prone to tendon injuries, and it was an Achilles problem that saw her miss the London 2012 Olympics.

She said: “I do feel a little bit gutted that the technology has only become available now.

“Instead of going out running on the road maybe I would have done more cross-training or work in the pool.”