Another year with similar concussion numbers as the previous. Higher. This year’s total is the highest since PRISP’s inception in 2002, according to a report published on Tuesday by the English Professional Rugby Injury Surveillance Project.
Eventually, it will become clear that the red-card wild-west rugby implemented formally on January 3, 2017, but unofficially before then, is not working and never will. To send players out and ban them for the worst (though by no means the only) incidents of head contact is designed to serve as a deterrence, but deterrents in the wider world only work when the infractions targeted are the product of intentional decision-making by the perpetrators in their own time.
Nowadays, no rugby players intentionally strike opponents in the head, and the time they spend deliberating about their actions can be quantified in fractions of a second. Anyone who insists that they only need to aim lower is typically lounging in a chair with Twitter open.
The objective is to eradicate upright tackling, however, any match can be observed for five minutes and the number of upright tacklers counted. They are ubiquitous and frequently the safest alternative. Therefore, what we are instructing players is, “Don’t make upright tackles. Except when you should. And if you make a mistake in that split-second, you’re eliminated.”
These players are the absolute finest in the world. If they are still hitting each other in the head after five and a half years, it may be because it is nearly impossible to prevent. Expect these red cards and the debates surrounding them to continue indefinitely. If the goal is to save rugby from the dementia apocalypse into which it is rushing, never expect these strategies to work.
Which is better than nothing, but the actual number in the real world, assuming there are no unexpected consequences, will be far lower and scarcely worth the assault on the sport’s character that this mad persecution of players represents. The available information indicates that there is no reduction, much alone a small one.
Moreover, if safeguarding the future health of rugby players is the ultimate objective, which it is, then this approach is based on the incorrect metric. Independent neurologists from all over the world – and not the discredited Concussion in Sport Group, whose findings so many governing bodies, including World Rugby, have concealed for so long – continue to provide evidence that concussion is not the primary risk factor for developing neurological conditions later in life.
Neurologists refer to the cumulative dose of energy pumped into the brain as the determining factor. In other words, the frequency with which rugby union players’ brains are rocked throughout the course of a lengthy career. There is not even a requirement for direct head contact. As revealed by the instrumented mouthguards used by Harlequins and others, more than half of the cumulative force a Premiership player experiences at the skull comes from collisions that do not affect the head.
This week, World Rugby launched its first attempt to escape the wreckage of the CISG, which in 2011 suggested that the minimum return-to-play schedule following a concussion should be six days. As has always been the case, the latest publication promises that the majority of concussed elite rugby players will not return for at least 12 months. In the absence of a player’s concussion history or persistent symptoms, the real minimum RTP has been extended by one day to seven.
All of this serves to chip away at the iceberg’s tip. We must cease distinguishing concussions from the hundreds of other times brains are rocked during a rugby game. On the same scale, they all weigh the same amount. Those considered to be concussive are those who exhibit immediate and obvious symptoms. At least they result in a respite from the beating when the concussed player is taken out of the game. We should be concerned about the players who continue to play while not displaying symptoms.
For a realistic solution to the CTE epidemic, rugby is in the hands of scientists. The most feasible option is the development of a therapy that could mitigate brain harm during a player’s career. Who can say? Neuroscience is on the eve of numerous innovations.
Sending innocent players off the field for unavoidable accidents would never alleviate brain injuries or the ridicule that rugby receives from so many people across the world. That is not caring for them; that is betrayal. This is rugby placing blame on the players for the sport’s nature.
