So now we have another doctor/specialist/scientist/whatever telling the world that after checking out 32 “amateur” football (sorry I mean soccer) players over a period of time that heading the ball can cause brain damage. Are they kidding? Will this start parents in North America to tell their children not to head the ball anymore?
In my time in both Canada and the United States, children appear to be afraid to head the ball, and during my time in both countries I have never seen coaches practising heading, although in the U.S. with the great infusion of South American and European players in the game and also into coaching it is becoming a more natural thing for the children to do.
First of all some statistics: Approximately 200 countries play soccer and there are about 2 billion children on this earth at the present time. In the UK alone (where I was born and educated) there are about 22,000 public schools with approximately 9 million children attending them.
In Portugal were I lived for 32 years, there are about 11,000 public schools with about 2 million children attending and in addition there are at least another 1,000 private schools.
Heading the ball in all countries with the exception of the United States and Canada comes naturally to the children from a very early age. The young ones are never coached, these children heading the ball with the forehead, turning the head slightly to the left or right depending on which direction they wanted the ball to travel.
The toughest and hardest part of the head is the forehead and the softest part is the top.
I do have some experience playing the game, first at school (all schools play the game at every age with no coach). I was good enough when I went on the grammar (high) school to play for the school against other schools, and at the age of 16 was picked to play for Liverpool schoolboys against Manchester and London in the under 18 team.
Eventually I was selected to play for a third division team called Tranmere Rovers which was a sort of farm team for Liverpool football club in those days. I continued to play the game competitively up to the age of about 50.
In those days the ball was made of leather and if wet became very heavy. If you didn’t head the ball with your forehead you were really hurt. I mention all this just to state that I do have some experience in playing the game and not just watching it and becoming an armchair “coach and expert”
I noticed when I occasionally watch boys around 10 or 11 years of age playing in B.C. before coming to Red Deer that a very high percentage of those boys
were obviously afraid to look directly at the ball when it was coming towards them, and a high percentage of them not really attempting to head or putting their head down as they jumped, resulting in the ball hitting the top of their head.
That can put those boys completely off trying to head the ball again.
The author of the article printed in the Advocate on Nov. 30 tested 32 amateur players, just 32. I wonder if he actually watched them head the ball, or did they tell him which part of the head they used?.
The statistics I stated was to give people an idea of how many children around the world play football. I estimate that one quarter continue to play the game after leaving school, a small number becoming professionals but the majority just playing for the love of the game, but competitively in leagues and many to the 60-year age mark.
In other words millions play the game from a very early age, for many years.
I have known a lot of English and European players over the years, some going on to other professions after retiring and some as interviewers, writers, commentators etc of the game. I’ve never heard or read of a single player outside of North America ever having any signs of concussion except those who collide heads when jumping together for the ball and even they are back playing within a couple of weeks at the most.
These so called results of brain damage carried out somewhere in the Unites States on 32 “amateur” players has been printed in the press in many countries in Europe and Central and South America and to say the least have been laughed at.
I hope that parents of school age children both in Canada and the United States after reading this “scientific test” do not tell their children to stop heading the ball, but teach them with the aid of coaches how to head the ball with the forehead and not the top or sides of their heads.
Don’t start coaching them at a too early stage, just allow them to run around with a ball having fun, because after all this game is fun and the most popular sporting game in the world played by millions of girls and boys around the world.
And to Dr. Michael Lipton and his associates I say “BOULDERDASH AND BUNKUM” or ‘ABSURDO ABSOLTO” or “UNA GRAN TONTERIA”.
James Taylor
Red Deer