Written by Phillip Bupp at The Comeback
U.S. Soccer revealed more information as well as the framework for their new youth player health and safety campaign. Two doctors involved in the campaign, Dr. George Chiampas and Dr. Margot Putukian were on hand to answer questions and further explain various parts of the campaign.
The U.S. Soccer player health and safety campaign, officially named Recognize to Recover, got much attention a few weeks ago when they revealed that heading would be banned in U-10 play and limited for youth players from U-11 to U-13. Even though heading would be banned and limited in preteen youth soccer circles, Dr’s. Chiampas and Putukian stated that when done the correct way, heading has not shown to cause concussions, based on information and research they have obtained.
Obviously, this can cause some confusion. A big question people will ask themselves is that if heading isn’t shown to cause concussions, why is it being banned? Dr. Chimpas stated that the intent of banning heading is to reduce aerial challenges, which can cause concussions. While the actual act of heading the ball hasn’t shown to cause concussions, an inadvertent elbow to head, head to head or head to ground collisions that come with aerial challenges to head the ball can potentially cause concussions and that’s what they want to limit. So while they didn’t come right out and say this, it does sound like some sort of heading drills could be okay since it will promote proper heading techniques and there would be no aerial challenge to speak of.
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