The National Rugby League was in a jubilant mood over the weekend, partying in Las Vegas and raking in the bucks.
It was party time for the NRL amid the glittering lights of Sin City, while just days earlier another sin was being laid bare by former star NRL players whose lives had been destroyed by repeated concussions.
That sin was the cavalier disregard rugby league, indeed all sports, showed when an athlete suffered a concussion.
To be fair they didn’t know then, but they do now.
The former Australian captain and rugby league legend, Wally Lewis, was one of the toughest men to have played the game.
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He said he’d been concussed countless times on the rugby league field to the extent that he couldn’t remember urinating in his pants during one game as he was being led from the field after the latest head knock.
Lewis, who’s been diagnosed with probable chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), told a gathering at Parliament House in Canberra his memory was absolutely shot.
Lynne McGregor, the wife of former South Sydney and St George player, Rod McGregor, said:
“It’s devastating … this was a man who could put his mind to anything he wanted to and now he can’t, he can’t do anything.”
McGregor said her husband suffered head knocks in practically every game he played in the 70s and even then his memory was already badly affected; he’d have to ask her if his side had won.
Former Newcastle fullback Robbie O’Davis was in tears listening to the two speak at the event organised by Dementia Australia.
Victoria and one-time Australia cricketer Will Pucovski has been concussed — yet again.
The latest sickening blow came in a Sheffield Shield match, when Pucovski missed a short ball from Tasmanian Riley Meredith, which saw him drop to the ground and stay there for two minutes in distress as concerned players and medical staff rushed to his aid.
It’s the second time Pucovski has had to retire hurt in the past six months and continues a wretched run of a dozen concussions for the talented batter.
It prompted the former Cricket Australia head doctor, Peter Brukner, to ask of Pucovski: “When is enough, enough?”
If Pucovski is to call time early on a promising career, he won’t be the first.
Recently it was the Melbourne AFL footballer, Angus Brayshaw.
He would be just the latest in a long line of athletes who have decided to place their long-term health at a higher priority than their short-term sporting careers.
Last year in the AFL they included Paddy McCartin, Paul Seedsman, Max Lynch and Marcus Adams.
Recent retirees in the NRL due to repeated concussions include Boyd Cordner, Jake Friend and Andrew Davey.
Players across the codes who have died with CTE include Shane Tuck, Danny Frawley, Graham “Polly” Farmer, Murray Weideman, Heather Anderson, Paul Green, Steve Folkes, Peter Moscatt and David Gillespie.
The Australian Sports Brain Bank has analysed about 100 brains, according to its research director, Alan Pearce from Latrobe University.
Professor Pearce said about 50 per cent of the brains analysed were shown to have CTE.
“Those brains include those donated by professional and amateur sportspeople,” Professor Pearce said.
Professor Pearce says there are about another 700 brains pledged — and although it’s a biased sample as the brains are generally donated by loved ones who have concerns — the current average suggests about half will come back with diagnoses of CTE.
So where do we stand on concussion as athletes leave the game and others line up to take sporting organisations to court?
We have discussions around the desks at ABC Sport if sports like rugby league will be allowed to exist in 20 or 30 years.
But then again, boxing and other martial arts continue despite calls for those sports to be outlawed.
Last month the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) released guidelines for youth and community sport on head knocks in sport.
The AIS recommended athletes should wait at least 14 days after their concussion symptoms ended before resuming contact training and at least three weeks before returning to competitive sport.
The guidelines also covered professional sport, recommending athletes not return to contact training for at least 10 days after their concussion symptoms had ended.
Specifically, it recommends that athletes and their doctors determine, if they’ve been concussion-symptom-free, do they get any symptoms after activity; do they feel “not right” and have they been cleared by their healthcare practitioner to resume contact and high-risk activities?
This recommendation — particularly the 10-day time frame — is a step beyond what the two major football codes in Australia stipulate in their current protocols.
The NRL has an 11-day protocol with each concussed athlete required to overcome a series of checks before moving on.
In the AFL, It’s 12 days.
When the AIS released its guidelines in February, the NRL said it would review them.
But now we have a situation where the competition has already begun, and there has been no statement on the AIS protocols — no guidance on whether it will act on the recommendation from Australia’s top sporting institute.
The Australian Rugby League Commission did meet in Las Vegas over the weekend, so it is possible concussion was discussed, but we are still waiting to see if that was the case.
The ABC is waiting for comment from the NRL on its response and why it didn’t occur before the season began.
The AFL said it would release its latest guidelines later this week and before the season began on Thursday night.
Neither the AFL nor NRL are obliged to follow the AIS recommendations. They are just that —recommendations.
But the fact they were designed in conjunction with leading medical bodies in Australia including Sports Medicine Australia, the Australian Physiotherapy Association, and Australasian College of Sport and Exercise Physicians, as well as partner bodies in the UK and New Zealand, suggests they should be taken seriously.
“It’s really important that the NRL and the AFL take on these recommendations because there’s no reason that a professional player should go back sooner than an amateur player,” Professor Pearce told ABC Sport.
“The major sports, AFL, NRL, rugby, cricket, generally seem to be a law unto themselves.
“And in concussion it tends to be par for the course — ‘we know what’s best’ — rather than being advised by an external body.
“We need to think to think of professional athletes as people rather than a commodity,” he added.
Those athletes just want to play, but they do also want to know that their long-term health is being protected.
That’s why about 100 former players are taking on the AFL in court.
The current players, their families and future players are within their rights to know how the major football codes will respond to the AIS recommendations … ideally not before a new season begins.
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