Some players silently focus on the game ahead, others exchange brief words with a familiar face in the opposition line-up.
Each has their own pre-game tunnel ritual as they wait to make their way to the pitch before kick-off.
Increasingly, for a host of Premier League players — among them Everton’s Richarlison and Mason Holgate — it is inhaling a mysterious powder in a small ampoule passed along by their team-mate.
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TV cameras filmed Holgate doing it before Everton’s home game against Burnley in March. Then on Monday evening, footage from the tunnel showed Richarlison doing the same before facing Crystal Palace.
Nev 🗣"The one thing about Merseyside is it will work you out quite quickly." 🤔
Carra 🗣"I worked you out quite quickly" 😂
Nev 🗣"Worked my brother out." 🤣
@Carra23 & @GNev2 are on fire tonight! 🍿 pic.twitter.com/7rVZ8TGQLj
— Toffee TV 🇧🇷🇨🇴🇫🇷🏴🇸🇪🇳🇴 (@ToffeeTVEFC) April 5, 2021
Curious supporters have watched and wondered, and The Athletic has learned they are taking the latest performance booster to cross the Atlantic from US sport.
The players are inhaling ammonia, more commonly known as smelling salts, from small single-use packets, which are around the same size as a ketchup sachet.
Sniffing the contents provides the user with a dual effect: a sudden surge of alertness and cleared airways thanks to its strong decongestant properties.
Imagine a super-strength blast of a menthol rub like Vicks along with an espresso and you’re in the right ballpark. It’s perfectly legal and breaches no World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) or Premier League guidelines over performance-enhancing supplements. But there is also no definitive medical evidence that the smelling salts offer any tangible benefits.
I have the exact same routine before starting my workday … gotta get hyped before entering the content & design mines. (And @SebiSalazarFUT [background] used to look quizzical at me in #DCU too) #MLSCupPlayoffs #MINvLA pic.twitter.com/KqSB2Tzuc1
— Mark McClure (@mrkmcclr) October 21, 2019
It isn’t the first time enhanced breathing through the nose and mouth has been targeted to help athletes take in more oxygen and improve their aerobic capacity to run faster and harder.
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Former Liverpool and England striker Robbie Fowler famously wore strips on his nose for a spell in the ’90s to open his nasal passages and let him take in more air during games. It sparked a copycat trend until mixed reports on efficacy saw the strips fall out of fashion.
Fowler wearing his nasal strip while playing for Liverpool in 1997 (Picture: Clive Brunskill /Allsport)
Other Premier League players, such as Wayne Rooney and Patrick Vieira, often daubed Vicks VapoRub on the front of their shirts to help them breathe better on the pitch.
Vieira, seen here in 2002, would often have a visible patch of Vicks VapoRub on his Arsenal shirt (Photo: Phil Walter/EMPICS via Getty Images)
The smelling salts trend isn’t new, either. Stars such as Samuel Eto’o and Landon Donovan both used them during their playing days. There has not, though, been a long-standing tradition of using them at Everton until this season.
So why have smelling salts — better known as a way to revive someone after fainting or to help boxers who have been dazed during a bout — become part of some Everton players’ pre-match routine?
“It’s like you’ve had an energy shot or something,” says one forward from a Championship club who sometimes uses ammonia before games. “It’s such a strong smell and it gives you that alive and alert feeling. Wakes you up. Then you feel like you’ve got that extra little spring in your step at kick-off.”
Another performance coach at a different Premier League club says his team’s players don’t use smelling salts, but he can see why they could become popular.
“It only needs one lad in the dressing room to start and his mate is curious, then he’s having a go,” he tells The Athletic. “Professional footballers can be an easily-influenced breed.
“If they had any proven effect we’d be using it and giving it to our players. It’s probably something they think gives them an edge so you could say it’s a placebo. A few of our lads drink mate tea before games because they’ve seen the South American players do it. All this does is give you a caffeine boost.
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“I’ve spoken to the ones who have it every day and explained that the body gets used to caffeine and needs more to get the same effect. They’d be better not having any for a few days before the game and then having some if they want but it’s habitual.”
During the 2018 World Cup, Russia’s team doctor was reportedly forced to defend his players’ use of the capsules after their round-of-16 penalty shootout win over Spain.
“We are talking about a simple ammoniac that you apply to buds of cotton wool and then inhale,” team doctor Eduard Bezuglov was quoted as telling local media in Russia.
“Thousands of athletes do the same thing to give themselves a lift. It’s been in use for decades. You can go to any pharmacy and buy ammonia and cotton buds. It does not constitute doping.”
Smelling salts have long been used by NFL and NHL players, with Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott on record about his belief in their powers.
Some NFL team staff have also vouched privately for the capsules’ ability to trigger the nervous system’s fight-or-flight response, which spikes levels of breathing, heart rate and alertness for a short period.
However, Dr James Malone, senior lecturer in coaching science at Liverpool Hope University, says a lack of research raises questions over their long-term health impact.
He is also worried that the habits of top-flight players, often broadcast on social media platforms, will soon trickle down to amateur footballers and become much more widespread. Then there is injury prevention, with the risk players hyped-up on smelling salts might potentially push their bodies too far.
Dr Malone, a specialist in the training response in elite Premier League players, explains: “Smelling salts are already popular among powerlifters, who take a smelling salt before a big lift to get that inhalation reflex, which is said to give them a temporary boost of performance.
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“But what we don’t have is the scientific evidence to prove that smelling salts work — in terms of football, are they actually improving anything?
“So far, there are just a handful of research papers that analyse smelling salts, none of which concern football, and a couple that focus on something called the rate of force development (RFD), a measurement of explosive strength.
“That, perhaps, makes sense if you’re a powerlifter performing a single deadlift, but if you’re talking football — a multi-dimensional sport when it comes to physical capacity — it’s very unlikely to have any effect on performance over a 90-minute match.”
Dr Malone suggests that for some players, smelling salts have now become part of their pre-performance routine, which is often shaped by habit and superstition.
“A player might have a coffee, get a massage and then, as part of the whole pre-game process, have a smelling salt before they head out in order to, in their mind, ‘switch themselves on’,” he says.
“Footballers are also a very superstitious bunch. If they win a game or perform well having taken a smelling salt, they’ll want to continue that habit.
“There’s a strong placebo effect at play here — if they think the smelling salts are having a positive effect, then that can be a good thing.
“But we have to ask, what are the adverse health effects? If smelling salts do become a habit, a player might end up taking them for 10 years or more across their whole career. There is currently little research on the long-term negative health effects of smelling salts, and that’s a worry. We don’t really know how taking smelling salts regularly will impact someone’s health later in life, particularly when a player retires.
“The other thing that concerns me is that smelling salts might take a player beyond the limits of how they might normally perform. A footballer might be carrying an injury, and then take a salt before they come on as a substitute, entering a state of ‘buzz’. That could, potentially, put them in a mindset to aggravate that injury.”
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There have also been concerns about the use of smelling salts when it comes to concussion, particularly in the NFL.
Dr Malone says strict protocols in the Premier League will ensure smelling salts don’t impact a player’s well-being — but routines may not be so strict in the lower leagues and amateur levels.
He adds: “Smelling salts should not be used as a treatment for concussion. If you have a player at an amateur level who suffers a bang to the head and has a concussion, but a smelling salt gets them back on the pitch, then that’s potentially masking some very serious health issues.
“And the issue here is that amateur players will see Premier League players taking smelling salts and follow suit. You need only look at pseudo-scientific fads such as Vieira’s Vicks VapoRub or Fowler’s nasal strip to see how things can catch on.
“Smelling salts are easily available to purchase online. Young players might think, ‘Well, the pros are doing it, I should be doing it too’. But if we don’t know the long-term negative health effects, we don’t want to introduce it to a wider population.”
Besides smelling salts, Dr Malone says there’s another footballing fad we should continue to be wary of — and that’s snus, the smokeless tobacco product taken by Leicester’s Jamie Vardy among others.
He says: “Compared to smelling salts, I’d suggest snus is more of a worry. A nicotine-based product like snus isn’t just addictive, it’s also terrible for your body. And anecdotal evidence suggests that a lot of footballers are taking snus at all levels of the game.
“The other thing to be aware of is CBD oil, with players using it without seeking medical or sport science advice before doing so.”
When it comes to smelling salts, the benefits beyond a quick buzz appear to be in players’ heads. But although there remains a belief it gives them an edge, it seems a few Everton players will be sniffing in the tunnel for some time to come.
