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Tack­le foot­ball before age 12 may boost risks of cog­ni­tive, mood dis­or­ders (Ars Tech­ni­ca):

“Tak­ing hard knocks ear­ly in life could shove foot­ball play­ers toward neu­ro­log­i­cal prob­lems lat­er, a new study sug­gests.

Among 214 for­mer ama­teur and pro­fes­sion­al male foot­ball play­ers, those who start­ed play­ing early—particularly before the age of 12—had greater risks of report­ing depres­sion and impaired behav­ioral reg­u­la­tion and exec­u­tive func­tion around their 50s, researchers found Read the rest of this entry »

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How the NFL tried to manip­u­late a gov­ern­ment study on foot­ball and brain injuries (Los Ange­les Times):

“The Nation­al Insti­tutes of Health seems to have dis­cov­ered what com­mu­ni­ties across the land already know: The Nation­al Foot­ball League is an untrust­wor­thy part­ner.

Accord­ing to a report Read the rest of this entry »

Can brain train­ing make bet­ter foot­ballers? (The Guardian):

“It sounds like a game designed for tod­dlers – throw­ing and catch­ing a ball to encour­age talk­ing – but, accord­ing to coach­es at Southamp­ton FC, brain-train­ing tech­nique Life Kinetik is the lat­est weapon in the war to stop mod­ern life ruin­ing the beau­ti­ful game Read the rest of this entry »

The NFL Needs Dis­tance From Its Brain-Injury Fund­ing (The Wall Street Jour­nal):

“Despite its immense pop­u­lar­i­ty among spec­ta­tors and play­ers, foot­ball is fac­ing an exis­ten­tial threat due to the long-term health risks pre­sent­ed by repet­i­tive injuries to the head. A new dis­ease has even been asso­ci­at­ed with these injuries—chronic trau­mat­ic encephalopa­thy, or CTE, the sub­ject of Read the rest of this entry »

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The ini­tial pilot, fund­ed under the EU Hori­zon 2020 frame­work and to be com­plet­ed by 2017, will start with lead­ing Euro­pean soc­cer acad­e­mies includ­ing Ajax Ams­ter­dam, PSV Eind­hoven, AZ Alk­maar and FC Freiburg, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Sports Uni­ver­si­ty in Cologne, Ger­many. Read the rest of this entry »