FIFA fails to address concussions
There was a recent skit on German TV featuring members of the country’s World Cup champions, and it went something like this.
Philipp Lahm, Manuel Neuer and Thomas Muller, three of Germany’s most influential players, appeared on a comedy to poke fun at teammate Christoph Kramer.
Kramer’s participation in last summer’s World Cup final against Argentina, if you remember, lasted 31 minutes after he received a ferocious accidental blow to the head, staggered to his feet confused and concussed, tried to continue, asked the referee if “this is really the World Cup fi- nal” and was eventually replaced.
On SportStudio months later, Neuer joked that Kramer asked if he could take over as goalkeeper. Lahm chortled that he thought Kramer was fine until his teammate tried to snatch away the captain’s armband. Muller jokingly stated that Kramer thought he had been transported back in time to 1974.
The stories were intended in jest. But amid all the hilarity, it also was a chilling indication of the way soccer, even at the
highest levels of the sport, treats head injuries and concussions with a profound lack of seriousness.
Fast-forward to the Women’s World Cup, and the concussion issue is a blind spot for FIFA.
The governing body congratulated itself in September for proposals allowing referees to halt a game for three minutes if a brain injury is suspected so a team doctor can perform an evaluation. The same doctor then decides if the player is fit to continue.
But such a small time frame, experts agree, is woefully insufficient for a thorough inspection. Also, it must be questioned whether a physician employed by a team is an appropriate person to be making that call.
FEMALES AT HIGHER RISK The injury to Kramer took place in the most-watched soccer match in history and appears to have prompted FIFA’s action. Yet FIFA should be just as concerned with head injuries in the women’s game. Studies indicate female players could be twice as likely to become concussed because of various medical factors.
“We hear about concussion a lot as a boys’ problem, mostly be- cause of (American) football,” said Christopher Giza, a pediatric neurologist and sports concussion expert who directs UCLA’s Steve Tisch Brain-SPORT Program. “But in sports where the rules are the same, it turns out that women are actually at a higher risk.
“Women in general have smaller necks and smaller muscle mass. (They have) less strong neck muscles. The bigger the mass is, the harder it is to move. So when (a typical male head) gets hit there is less movement, (and) you have less possibility for brain movement injury.”
Giza said many athletes suffering from concussions hide their symptoms, either because of fear of losing their place on the team, a failure to understand the repercussions or pressure from parents or coaches to battle on.
Briana Scurry, the USA’s World Cup winning goalkeeper from 1999, saw her career ended five years ago after complications from a concussion.
She experienced “intense, piercing headaches” and severe bouts of depression and anxiety.
“I felt disconnected from the world; from my friends, my family and my life,” Scurry said. “I was able to block out 90,000 people and focus in 107-degree weather during the World Cup in 1999 in the final, but (post-concussion) I couldn’t figure out where my car was.”
Scurry had nerve release surgery last year that has improved her condition. She has become a passionate and outspoken campaigner to raise awareness about the dangers of concussions.
If so desired, soccer’s powers that be could implement protective measures. Scurry favors a substitution rule specific to head injuries, whereby an affected player could be substituted for long enough to be analyzed properly, without the substitution counting toward the allotted number of three replacements.
SEEKING SOLUTIONS A small but growing number of players wear various forms of protective headgear, including U.S. national team members Carli Lloyd and Ali Krieger.
The market leader is Full90, a San Diego-based firm that sells a range of soccer-specific protective wear that is fully authorized after initial hesitation from FIFA. The headgear is popular in youth soccer and among players who have suffered prior head trauma.
Full90 founder Jeff Skeen acted after his daughter suffered from concussions in youth soccer. “Some of the soccer organizations, they were just really against anything that highlighted the fact that so many head injuries were occurring in the sport. It really dispelled the notion that soccer was a non-contact sport,” he said.
Skeen wants major companies such as Nike or Under Armour to enter the soccer headgear market and pay players they endorse to wear the products, which he thinks would have the effect of turning the items into a fashionable must-have rather than “the sign of a wounded warrior.”
Head injuries in soccer come in various guises. Kramer’s skull crashed into Argentinian Ezequiel Garay’s shoulder. Scurry was impacted by a rival’s knee. Krieger was poleaxed in a headto-head collision.
Soccer is also a sports outlier in that the skull is used as a means with which to strike the ball.
According to Giza, a header in a training situation, controlled and with proper technique, should offer low risk for damage. In game situations, however, with the ball coming from different angles and with players jostling for position, perfect contact cannot be guaranteed.
Research into the effects of heading is ongoing.
The U.S. team doesn’t need to look far to find an example of concussion problems. The squad for Scurry’s last major tournament, the 2007 World Cup, included seven members of this year’s group.
Current defensive backup Lori Chalupny suffered a series of concussions that kept her off the national team for five years before U.S. Soccer medical experts were convinced she had recovered enough to be reinstated.
Former national team stars, including Brandi Chastain, have advocated banning players younger than 14 from heading the ball to reduce brain-related injuries.
But any change to the game at the top level, such as mandating headgear, tinkering with the substitution rule, allowing for longer evaluation breaks or limiting heading of the ball, faces a gross challenge to find its way into the laws of FIFA.
But if the sport’s hierarchy expects its participants to use their heads in the pursuit of victory, is it too much to ask that they themselves use their own more effectively in the name of safety?