Player Welfare...how's it going?

[backrower8]

I have just read this comprehensive article from the BBC about the pending results of a year-long South Wales University study of a URC/ PRO14 team. The results are being published tomorrow (Wednesday 1st September)

www.bbc.com/sport/rugby-union/58369271

It looks at how cognitive function in pro players is affected by head impacts (large and small) and finds that cognitive function can reduce over time across a single season.

Our sport is in ever-deepening trouble and way off course as regards brain injuries, and only the bravest, most long-sighted leaders, whistle-blowers and advocates will get us back on track and hopefully save the game by adequately de-risking it.

I don't have a definition of what level of de-risk we need but it will be decided by public opinion before it is efined by the rugby community - parents will decide first and TV companies/sponsors second. Hopefully the latter group will be encouraged to lobby for changes out of public pressure for a safer/ethical spectacle. We all have an important part to play in this.

Soccer is currently putting together the evidence of what a career spent 'just' heading a football does to the brains of its ageing heroes, and rugby can no longer say that it is not aware of the risks arising from playing the game.

According to this study, there can be up to 11,000 contacts in just ONE season for a professional player. So 100,000+ contacts in a full pro-career, well over 50,000 for anyone even playing for 5 years and that's ignoring all the contacts acquired in adolescent/underage rugby.

Are we confident that World Rugby is addressing the question - Quo vadis?

For me they continue to fiddle while Rugby burns. Yes it is moving up their risk management chart, but not to the level or speed that we need it to be.

If we don't evolve quickly enough then Sevens, Tag and Mini rugby may be all that survives, or dominates the rugby landscape in a couple of decades.

I think that I could live with that easier than propping up a sport that, to varying degrees, cognitively damages significant numbers of its former participants for the remaining 40-60 years of their potentially impaired lives.

I haven't mentioned the spate of documented deaths of players arising both directly from heavy contacts in matches in recent years and others who died of CTE-related illness following long rugby careers featuring multiple concussions.

It is the eleventh hour for our sport. We have been and are being warned - all the time.

[Dexter]

Good points, could be an interesting thread!

Is enough being done to encourage/facilitate a type rugby which would be less likely to produce a high number of bad injuries or concussions? Do the laws (or their "interpretation", although I hate that phrase) and officiating need to alter and if so how much? Will collision-based "anti-rugby" tactics continue to win things at the highest level? The Lions series is the most recent high level event to show how bad things are/can be...

[Oldschool]

It's a small thing but I hate to see players "patting" even other on the head. Why add to the load?

[domhnallj]

Its an interesting study - I skimmed through it quickly yesterday. However, the statistical approach (factorial ANOVA) doesn't capture any real-time information of how behaviour over the season affects cognitive performance. Basically the study is pre-season v post-season cognitive decline on a limited number of players (21) which couldn't be the full roster even for a Welsh team. I'd like to know if the decline is permanent or whether time-off negates the effects of small/large collisions and which isn't captured/addressed here; is there improvement between post-season and pre-season? There is a lot here but it raises a whole lot more questions. It's nice to see some data to get the discussion going.

[Ruckedtobits]

Its an interesting study - I skimmed through it quickly yesterday. However, the statistical approach (factorial ANOVA) doesn't capture any real-time information of how behaviour over the season affects cognitive performance. Basically the study is pre-season v post-season cognitive decline on a limited number of players (21) which couldn't be the full roster even for a Welsh team. I'd like to know if the decline is permanent or whether time-off negates the effects of small/large collisions and which isn't captured/addressed here; is there improvement between post-season and pre-season? There is a lot here but it raises a whole lot more questions. It's nice to see some data to get the discussion going.

Totally agree. It does not appear to have been a collaborative study with the medical expertise who worked with the players throughout the year and doesn't appear to be an entire Squad. If the actual Squad size was 40-45 (not an unusual assumption), and the 'missing' 20+ players had zero impairment, or even cognitive improvement from getting physically fitter, the results would have been very different - but probably less attractive to international publicity.

But that's how some sports research is conducted, with two eyes on the public profile of the research findings rather than its intrinsic use to the subjects.