Nottingham Forest’s Chris Wood heads the ball under pressure from Sunderland’s Omar Alderete (Image: getty)
If I were the mother of a young boy or girl with their hearts set on a career in professional football, I’d be so angry with the FA (Football Association) right now I’d be unable to speak. This week, the FA claimed that there is “no proof” that heading the ball causes brain damage. This is akin to the tobacco industry’s last-gasp (grim pun intended) attempts in the 1960s to deny the link between smoking and lung, throat and mouth cancer. Self-serving, wilfully ignorant and preposterous.
Or the equally absurd campaigning by the anti-seatbelt lobby at around the same time to argue that seatbelts made driving more, not less dangerous. (Remember all that guff about being trapped by a faulty belt in a burning/sinking car? Specious nonsense).
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Well the FA have probably outdone both lobby groups in mendacity. In a 41-page defence to a High Court claim seen by the Daily Telegraph, the FA disputes that repeated heading of the ball caused devastating neurological disease in any of the 96 claimants. They also refute suggestions that the FA has a “duty of care” to footballers.
This absolutely beggars belief. The evidence that headers cause chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), a type of dementia specifically associated with head impacts, is overwhelming. The FA ITSELF commissioned a 2017 study that found former footballers are 350% more likely to die of neurodegenerative disease than the wider population. THREE HUNDRED AND FIFTY %!
It also found players in positions involving more heading were more at risk. For example, defenders (regular headers) are five times more likely to succumb to CTE than goalkeepers, who rarely head the ball.
The evidence pours in from all sides. Dr Ann McKee is a world authority on CTE after dissecting the brains of hundreds of former sportsmen and says there is “overwhelming evidence” that head trauma causes the disease, and that repeated “smaller hits”, rather than rarer big ones, are mostly responsible.
Anecdotal evidence is everywhere you look. The 1966 England World Cup-winning squad would later be decimated by CTE.
As for that denial of “duty of care”… if it’s not the FA’s responsibility, who the hell’s is it? Shame on them.
Hats off and the best of luck!
Mixed reviews for ITV’s primetime new thriller Secret Service but hats off to its star Gemma Arterton. The former Bond girl was never entirely alone, even when filmed in long shot during a solo scene.
Gemma always had company – in the form of her unborn child. She hid her pregnancy (three months at the start of filming) with flappy jackets and flowing overcoats, but says by six months it was “just undeniable! I think they had to do CGI on me because it was so obvious”. Good luck, Gemma!
Let’s just call it a generational divide…
Richard won’t thank me for telling you, but he turns 70 later this month. It’s not that he’s particularly in denial about it, but he says he’d just rather ignore the milestone completely.
All our family’s attempts to suggest a special celebration have been politely but firmly rebuffed.
Age is such a moveable feast. According to a poll this week, Gen Z reckons when you reach 53, you’re officially in old age. Puhl-LEEZE!
Meanwhile Millennials (30-45) think you turn into an old crock at 63, whereas us Boomers (61-79) reckon you’re still in middle-age until you reach 75.
So amongst his peers, at least, my husband has five years left before the notional pipe, slippers and rocking chair beckon.
Perhaps he’ll take a leaf out of Sir Trevor Nunn’s book when he gets there.
The doyenne of British theatre, now 86, says he counts backwards on each birthday.
So by his reckoning he’s now in his late 50s (and looking pretty good, actually). Food for thought, if not, in Richard’s case, birthday cake.
