Players must be educated to take responsibility for their own brain health

• Date: 19 December 2020
• Published date: 19 December 2020
• Author: Matt Williams

In recent years, World Rugby has taken some credible steps in dealing with concussion. Despite these efforts, everyone linked with the game knows that many more significant changes to the laws and concussion management for player safety are essential.

In Ireland's recent match against Scotland, anyone who witnessed Andrew Porter, with Iain Henderson bound to his back, running at full pace and smashing into Stuart Hogg to clear him out, will know the game must change. Hogg was bent over a tackled Irish player, "jackling" for the ball. It is an extremely dangerous and vulnerable position. Under the law it was a legal act and Porter and Henderson are blameless. How Hogg stood up uninjured after that collision was miraculous.

That sickening type of collision happens multiple times in every game. World Rugby must use great wisdom but they must act swiftly to change the law to make the tackle contest safe.

In the 1980s, rugby went through a similar period of crisis regarding player safety. Many players across the globe suffered serious spinal injuries during scrums. With law changes and player education, scrums are now very safe.

Caution to change the laws needs to be balanced with haste because rugby must ensure that the present generation of players do not walk down the same path as Lipman and Thompson.

Despite the current narrative being pushed across the globe, the responsibility of how rugby reached this crisis point does not rest solely on the shoulders of the law makers.

There is an aspect to these terrible stories in this concussion crisis that belongs to the individuals.

The men who are now dealing with brain trauma were mature adults when they were suffering repeated concussions. Some were senior internationals. Why did they not stop playing? Why did they continue playing into their mid-30s with repeated concussions?

Where was their personal responsibility for their own health in their playing days?

Michael Lipman was born in England and brought up in Australia. I knew Michael during his schoolboy days at St Joseph's College in Sydney and we met during his playing days in England where he played for Bath and England, before returning to play Super Rugby in Melbourne.

Michael is a very good man.

In July 2012, he did an interview for the Sydney Morning Herald with journalist Stathi Paxinos. The words from that interview now make very uncomfortable reading.

"The openside breakaway [flanker] estimates he has had more than 30 cases [of concussion]...