Just a survey about what others feel about this? It's anecdotal, but do any of you know soccer players in their 50s and older, do they show any effects of cognitive decline?
I am 74 played most of my life. Also played American football did a lot of head first tackles spearing. I had my share of concussions mostly from American football. My last game I played I passed out three times on the field. Then kept getting up blocked three punts in that game they tell me. I played with the old ball and the new ball. The old ball was a bitch to head especially when it rained and got heavy from the rain. Most concussions with the new ball happens when the player lets the ball hit him and not when you hit the ball. The biggest cause of concussions is from elbow, forearm or head to head and not from the ball. You have to know how to protect the space you are heading in. Do that your less likely to get hurt. Some players get hurt when their in the wall to try to help the keeper when the opponent takes a free kick. A lot of youth players do not know how to protect themselves in the wall.
My over 40 team has quite a few 50's. Most of them were dumb to begin with, so its tough to say. Seriously though, many of the people that I play with probably didn't play enough through the years to accumulate the effects of heading. Aches and pains are far more prevalent. As a defender, I do try to avoid goal-kick and punt heading. Even right form that still hurts like hell. Game isn't that important to me. I'll find another way to hurt myself.
Besides jumping ability think of another perspective. How much space do you take up when you head the ball? Think big as you go up------ elbows out and up, forearms out and extended forward about head high and your hands are attached to them which always helps to move an opponent. Besides all that, you got your chest taking up space. You built yourself a pretty big area to head in. You also made an area that could keep opponents away from your area to head in. All you need to do for that to happen is beat the opponent to the jump. You made yourself a lot of room to head the ball. Ever see the way players box out for rebounding in basketball? They use their arms and hands, and body to clear out space to rebound before they rebound. So you see some smaller players get a lot more rebounds then some bigger players. Make yourself big and jump early
Never heard of, when I started training at the beginning it hurt but I would find ways to head without feeling pain, I guess if you put enough strength your brain doesn't shake from the difference in acceleration when you hit the ball.
Most contact is from someone leaning over to head the ball. So to minimize it: 1) make your jump as vertical and high as possible (for the play) keeping your head above your core and 2) you can keep a marker farther away from you by turning so your shoulder is pointing at him. It is only a six inch difference, but I find that 6 inches of space makes a difference. If he still jumps in, he is going to make contact with your shoulder (which will absorb a lot of the force of any collision) and I think you are likely to draw a foul unless advantage is given. I don't believe making yourself bigger by extending the hands and elbows helps at all to prevent a marker from jumping into your space. In fact doing that encourages him to jump into you instead of vertically. I realize its a popular coaching point for handling contact, but I believe in charging--not pushing. Charging uses your body weight and legs--much more force applied than pushing with your hands.
One of my past players is Gio Saverese also played with the Metrostars. Now he coaches the New Cosmos. I never taught him what I am about to post here. He got it from a team mate the other striker who was from England when they both played for the Long Island Roughriders. If a back had position on him on headers he would move into the backs space. He did it by using a forearm to the back of the backs head in one motion then head the ball into goal. He did not do it with us, but he did do it a lot with the Metrostars. He never got called for it that I can remember with the Metrostars. I have to watch the cosmos play to see if he taught his strikers to do it.
neck strength to reduce concussions... http://sports.yahoo.com/news/neck-strength-reduce-concussions-womens-093308356.html
There has actually only been one report of a concussion from a header reported in the medical literature. The problem is much bigger in American football, but the problem is more from the motion of the head than the impact to the head -- your brain sloshes around in your skull. So neck strengthening is a good idea. In soccer, collisions with other players is the biggest cause of head injuries. We've seen some of those already in this World Cup.
Very little is known about the long term effects of impacts to the head. Concussion is a medical term for a specific brain injury, with a risk of long term effects. No concussion detected doesn't mean no injury. And more important in my mind, children may have different risks than adults. I believe teaching proper heading and receiving technique is important, but I don't believe its necessary or wise to practice heading repetitively.
Sorry, I meant to say only one case of chronic traumatic encephalopathy associated with heading. There have been lots of concussion cases, though most soccer concussions result from contact with another player.
Brandi Chastain along with some advocacy groups launched a campaign today to stop children under 14 from heading.
Here is their press release. http://sportswithoutinjury.com/does-soccer-heading-cause-brain-damage/ (Except for punts and goal kicks) the impact of heading the ball is not really the problem. The metric cited is "fudged" by lumping in heading with collisions while attempting to head (i.e., 30% of concussions are caused by heading or attempting to head the ball and colliding with another player)--a typical lawyer's trick to twist facts to support an argument. It is the incidental contact while heading during the run of play that is the greater risk. And what they don't address is that the majority of concussions--70%--are not caused by heading. I don't have a problem with eliminating heading during matches for U14s and below, but (having written a LAW modification banning slide tackles) I believe that it will be difficult to write an intelligent rule taking heading out of the game. The only practical option I see is to treat "heading" like "handling." Allow only keepers (inside their penalty area) to use their heads to play the ball and extend the keeper's protection against challenges to cover heading. Referees can interpret it by analogy to handling.
Back to the damage that may (or not) occur from heading itself, I've been wondering whether some mitigation might be offered if heading practice was done with a felt indoor ball. It wouldn't avoid brain-slosh effects from the neck snap but would, I'd think, offset some of the contact force in practices where you're heading the ball over and over and over. Admittedly, the ball is not the same but I think some of the contact fundamentals could still be taught despite those differences.