England first to legislate on football concussion, protective measures | Premier League

When it was confirmed in England that Sir Bobby Charlton suffers from dementia, concern about the association of this disease with the collisions and blows to the head suffered by footballers went from being a matter of private conversation to a priority for the organizers of the competitions. This, in short, is a very serious matter.

In the last hours, a joint statement by the League and the Football Association was produced that established a schedule for the launch of the new protocol, which will allow teams to make up to two additional permanent substitutions when concussion cases occur in a match. .

The model calls for the rival to make the equivalent number of changes, so if a concussion surrogate is used, they can make a change.

The new protocol will enter into force for the first time in the FA Cup from the fifth round, in this month of February, according to the FA, a method that will be used in the Super League and the Women’s Championship as of February 6, with the go-ahead of the International Football Association Board, the game’s legislative body.

“The trial is the result of the IFAB’s consultation with stakeholders and the recommendations of its concussion expert group to allow additional substitutions for players with actual or suspected concussion,” the official statement said.

However, the protocols have been criticized by brain injury specialist Dr. Willie Stewart, who described them as akin to “putting lipstick on a pig.” He, like the worldwide players’ union FIFPRO, had been in favor of a 10-minute evaluation period for a player with a concussion with a temporary replacement.

FA Executive Director Mark Bullingham defends his idea and says the protocol is functional: “I’m really surprised that this is seen as an excuse. I see that this goes further. We will remove any player suspected of concussion from the field. I don’t follow the logic there. I understand that there are two models that have different values ​​but, from our point of view, we see this as a stronger model, the safest model, and that is what medical experts advise us. “

Charlton case, the trigger

Nobby Stiles was the fifth member of the only English national team champion to have been diagnosed with dementia. But it was not until the case of Bobby Charlton became known, which was added to that of his brother Jack, who died in July, that of Ray Wilson and Martin Pieters, that the concern about the relationship between the soccer practice and degenerative dementia disease.

Research revealed by the BBC showed that former footballers are three and a half times more likely to die from this disease than the general population.

“These older players are dying like my dad,” said John Stiles in conversation with Alan Shearer, former captain of the British team. “Many don’t have medals to sell. It’s okay, of course, to seek to identify the cause of dementia in older players, but actually the cause is irrelevant to older players. Because they need help now. I hope Dad’s death is the catalyst to address this scandal. “

The concern is real in the United Kingdom and in Scotland they advanced when the daughter of former West Bromwich Albion forward Jeff Astle decided to investigate whether her father’s repetitive training had something to do with his death from a brain disease that is usually related to boxers.

“When his father (Jess Astle) played soccer, there were training sessions that he devoted solely to hitting the ball with his head. Hundreds of times a day,” Michael Gray, professor at the University of East Anglia and head of a new study trying to solve the equation between soccer and dementia.

The defense of some is that football has changed a lot since 1966, that the balls no longer weigh so much, that medical services are better and the aggressiveness of certain players has had to decrease due to the risk of expulsions and sanctions. But does that eliminate the risk of disease? Gray thinks not.

“Hitting a ball as a way of life is a risk. It does not mean that every person who hits a ball with his head is going to have dementia, but we want them to understand what the risk is,” he said in a talk with EFE.

“It may have been a greater risk for those who played soccer years ago, but it has nothing to do with the fact that they played with heavier balls than now. That is not the problem. The problem is the number of times they are hit a ball, for example during training, “he added.

“Nobody wants to change the game or force people not to play, what we want is to reduce the head butts during training and limit the head butts in children. They should never hit him with the head”, reflected the expert.

Already in the United States and Scotland, children have been limited and even prohibited from hitting the ball with their heads. It is a beginning, just like the first rules they want to impose on English football. But there is still a lot of ground to investigate and to control in the rules of the game and training.