Brain injury expert calls for ban on heading in football

[RHB]

time to give this some air time again by the look of things.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/45110282

I was a central defender for virtually the whole of my amateur career (apart from when I though I could get away with being a centre forward). By the very nature of the position heading the ball was a natural and necessary part of the game and I had my fair share of bashes and collisions where my head took the majority of the damage. I never thought for a moment that it was dangerous to head a ball, unless some arse of a centre forward added his elbow into the mix. I played at various organised levels from 14 up to my late 30s when age and injuries finally caught up. Would I have taken any notice of this sort of medical advice? very probably not.

So what do you think.

 

[MK Shrimper]

I guess Dr Bennet Omalu is the expert here, but you're not going to stop it. Besides, a lot of things in life are risky and are going to impact your life negatively in some form, so you can't wrap adults up in cotton wool.

Under 18 - yeah, fair enough.

 

[rigsby]

Don’t forget back then Rootshall The ball was like a spunge and would soak water, which made it twice as heavy. What about if you headed the lace....

 

[RHB]

Don’t forget back then Rootshall The ball was like a spunge and would soak water, which made it twice as heavy. What about if you headed the lace....

Yep, that hurt at times.

 

[Ricky Otto]

Don’t forget back then Rootshall The ball was like a spunge and would soak water, which made it twice as heavy. What about if you headed the lace....

I don't know if anybody watched the Alan Shearer documentary about this?

As Rigsby says the ball back in the 60's, 70's was a totally different proposition. There wasn't really any compelling evidence to suggest there is a danger with the balls used today and even with the old ball the cases of dementia were few and far between.

IMO MK has it right, there is risks in loads of sports and other activities, you can't get too nanny state. I don't see a problem with getting rid of headers in the kids game as anyone who has watched will see, the kids rarely try to head anyway until they get to about 15 yrs old