Footballers and dementia

My nearly 70 year old OH has memories of heading a water-laden leather football at school and university. Today’s ball is plastic, lighter and doesn’t absorb water.

It will be too late for some men whose careers have been in football but I firmly agree heading the ball should be banned now as the evidence is there how much damage can be suffered by an unprotected head.

M0nica

I completely agree with Bluebelle. the game is called football, not _head and foot_ball.

100% agree with this. Head contact with the ball needs to be banned and while they are at it boxing needs to be completely banned. That barbaric “sport” is nothing of the sort.

I completely agree with Bluebelle. the game is called football, not _head and foot_ball.

Why use the head at all I don’t see why it can’t be kept to feet only, it wouldn’t make the game any less interesting
I believe heading the ball should be banned from now on they have enough knowledge of the dangers

The FA has already sent out new rules to clubs and coaches that children under the age of 7 should not be allowed to head the ball.

More is probably required but it is a start.

My grandson loves his football. I really, really want to tell him to leave a ball rather than head it but I know he'd agree with me and then ignore.
Rugby has put all sorts of restrictions on what young players can do and I think football should do so too. I'd be happier if football meant 'you can touch the ball with your feet' and there were strict rules about how to deal with a ball in the air as there are already in hockey.
Very sad to see so many great footballers brought low by this dreadful disease.

Just to add to what you have written:

A major study carried out by the University of Glasgow in the autumn of 2019, under the supervision of Dr Willie Stewart, showed that professional footballers are three-and-a-half times more likely to develop dementia than non-footballers.

“The Stiles family asked us to look at Nobby’s brain and try to give them some understanding of what his pathology was, and how it related to his career in football,” explains Dr Stewart.

“In doing a thorough investigation into the pathology, we discovered that what he was suffering from was a condition known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy, which is a degenerative brain pathology which we associate with exposure to head injury and head impacts.”

www.skysports.com/football/story-telling/11095/12174891/the-boys-of-66-how-englands-world-cup-heroes-are-losing-their-battle-with-dementia