To steer DS away from rugby?

[Oldjumper]

DS is 10 and plays contact rugby for local club.
He loves it and is good-fast, strategic and tackles well.
But he is the smallest in his team and when up against big lads from other teams I worry he will get very hurt. They don’t put them in positions for another couple of years so he can easily be up against someone twice his size and he will go in for the tackle regardless of the size of his opponent.

On the other hand it’s great exercise and the teamwork is incredible. It comes with a good social life (although I also worry about the excessive alcohol culture in a few years time!)

Especially with the sad news stories about Doddie Weir & Rob Burrows and the increase in the chance of neurological issues in rugby players (albeit professional ones not junior club players!). It makes me wonder if I am doing the right thing in encouraging him and whether I should steer him towards concentrating on his other sports.

They should be split by size and strength through the tweens and teens and not just by age. I agree with regard to the suggestion to try rugby league, and/or rowing, and what has been said about ambulances, and also with the positives of the sport. You would not be being unreasonable either way.

We're in New Zealand and when my son played rugby at junior level it was organized by weight as well as age, so to play in an under 11 team you also had to be below a certain weight and would move up to the next age level if not. It was actually the reason my son stopped playing as he was big for his age but didn't want to play with older kids, however it makes sense for safety reasons. I'm happy enough that he had moved to other sports by high school age anyway as I think that's when it gets more serious.

Rugby has been a no for my sons. They are incredibly sporty, and play several other things. We have had plenty of injuries, but there is a real difference between a broken arm from a basketball fall to the serious risks that rugby poses in later life. I find it puzzling the amount of people using their young adult as an example of how wonderful rugby is….. I wonder if they will still view it as positively when their 50 year old son is one of the MANY diagnosed with severe neurological problems as a result of cumulative head trauma. To me, nothing is worth that risk, particularly when there are so many other sports they could play.

Non contact though

I agree, especially for children.

I don’t blame you for pausing to assess. I’m a Brit in the US and my husband and I were in agreement from when our boys were young, that American football would be a no-go. Concussions are fairly commonplace, even among young kids. So my eldest plays football and basketball, and the younger isn’t into team sports at all.

No way would I encourage young people to play rugby, knowing what we do today about CTE and other brain injuries. Look at the better understanding we have of concussion now, when previously players would get straight up and run it off. Developing brains are much more vulnerable too. Is he any good at rowing?

YANBU. I've always steered my children away from rugby as it's just so brutal. Thankfully they have been much more in to football, cricket and running

Steer clear of collision based sports.

Players are getting bigger, faster, more athletic, meaning the hits are bigger and more dangerous. Both rugby codes are in trouble with the concussion issue. Massive massive blokes. There are players now who have necks thicker than their heads.

Rugby concussions on the rise as players increase in size:

www.irishtimes.com/life-and-style/health-family/fitness/rugby-concussions-on-the-rise-as-players-increase-in-size-1.3777673

Concussion rates in elite rugby hit highest levels since records began:

www.theguardian.com/sport/2022/jun/21/concussion-rates-in-elite-rugby-hit-highest-levels-since-records-began

On average, every 25 games a rugby player will have a concussion.

When these sports were invented, players were regular sized blokes. Generally speaking they were safe(ish). That’s changed. Neither are safe to play.

Football had an issue way back with heading heavy balls (and often), but the balls are much lighter now (and don’t soak up water which made the balls weigh a tonne like they used to). In the 1960s/70s Geoff Hurst used to spend half an hour just constantly jumping up and heading a ball hanging from a rope. That’s unheard of now as heading is also kept to a minimum in training (banned at youth level).

Football is a skill based sport. The emphasis is playing with the ball (passing, shooting, dribbling), and honing your technique. You won’t come home bruised and battered after a training session, which is the case with the rugby codes.

Purely anecdotal here.

Used to work in an all boys school, no football, all rugby.
In 6 years, we had the air ambulance twice, just to training, not a match. Two boys in back braces due to injury, more dislocated collarbone and broken limbs than I can recall.

Same amount of time in a mixed sex school. No rugby, just football. No air ambulances, no back braces, plenty of lower limb/foot fractures though.

Maybe exaggerated slightly but not much- I’m taking about the big 16y olds who can be playing against 14y olds here due to the way the age groups are set up here- our young-for-their-school-year boys play 2 years at U16s. Our biggest boys are def well over 80kg and I’ve seen boys who look significantly bigger than them in opposition teams.

I worked with adults with head injury and major disabilities - I would not allow my son anywhere near rugby - ever.

This is such a difficult one. The benefits of playing Rugby are immense. It builds fitness, strength, competitiveness, resilience, physical courage, respect & teamwork in a way few other activities can match. The downside is that the risk of concussion, brain & spinal injuries is unacceptably high, and we are only starting to understand how dangerous repeated head trauma really is.

My view is that Rugby faces a choice. It either has to change to take the head & neck out of the contact area, or the game will die as people become more aware of the scale of the risks.

I agree that head injuries are a problem in rugby but football produces a massive amount of longterm knee and hip problems. My DH is crippled by a knee injury he sustained at 21. He should have had a knee replacement in his mid 40s but was too young. Now at 60 he can hardly walk but will be unable to have a replacement for a while having recently had a stroke.
A very common injury in football is a malar fracture ( cheek bone). I suspect the force needed to break the cheek bone would cause a mild concussion. Repair involves surgery.
Lower limb injuries are very common in both rugby and football but the added “skill” needed for football results in twisting the knee joint. Hard tackles in football put a lot of lateral force on knees.
Both sports are responsible for keeping orthopaedic surgeons in business.
I think it’s safe to say that all forms of sport will result in an injury of some sort. As an ex rower, many end up with longterm back problems and it also involves a great deal of land training, running and weights. So there is still a great deal of opportunity for injury. In addition there have been drownings and regular concussions when boats collide during training and you get knocked on the head by a fast moving blade.
Don’t get me started on cycling. I used to dread the start of the summer holidays. We would usually see at least one or two young children who had flown over the handlebars and damaged their teeth. Fortunately the cycle helmets protect them from facial injury, however helmets don’t protect against concussion as mentioned in previous posts. The brain is still going to rattle when you decelerate rapidly. One of the worst facial fractures I’ve seen was a patient’s face hitting a curb, despite wearing a helmet she shattered her lower jaw into multiple pieces. She hasn’t been on a bike since.
Im not trying to defend rugby or any contact sport but we should risk assess all sport. Rugby as grass roots level has altered beyond recognition in the light of longterm consequences of concussion. The RFU are continually working towards limiting regular head injuries. Most participants are not going to become professional players where the likely hood of longterm damage is far greater.
Sport encourages youngsters to self risk assess. If it hurts they are less likely to take certain risks. By wrapping them in cotton wool and bubble wrap they fail to learn from experience. DS is well aware of how much body contact hurts, he actively avoids physical fights, preferring to resolve conflict via negotiation. He loves rugby but has said that he probably won’t continue to play adult rugby. Older players have not been coached to the same level as his generation and still take far too many risks. His love is cricket, the ultimate non contact sport where you wear helmet, padding and apart from team celebrations no one comes with a few yards of each other.

It’s a tough one isn’t it. On one hand you have the worry of serious injury but on the other, if anything like my son there’s the aspect of him finding his “tribe”
Since starting Rugby my son has grown so much in himself, his confidence and his health. He went from feeling he wasn’t good at anything and was slightly overweight to playing well and the extra puppy fat being a thing of the past.
He’s been recruited to an elite performance course at a really good college due to his rugby playing which has given him the much needed shove to really knuckle down academically in order to get the GCSE grades to attend so he can play Rugby for them.

But yeah, broken ankles, noses, and a knackered sciatic nerve later… thankfully the team he plays for is brilliant and makes sure his personal safety comes first. Due to the pulled muscle (ironically done whilst playing football at school) that has effected his sciatic nerve, he hasn’t played a match in weeks and has only just started doing light training last week.

Mine never played at primary school, played a bit at secondary and now, at university, is loving all things rugby related - the playing, social life, training - all of it.

So you can steer him away now but if there is an underlying love of the game you might not be able to do so for ever!

A group of 185 professional and semi professional players are suing the WRU and World Rugby. They include former Welsh captain Ryan Jones who has been diagnosed with early onset dementia aged 41. I am worried about the future of rugby tbh.

www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/rugby/rugby-news/full-list-accusations-rugby-players-24579869

Whilst most playing most contact and non-contact can result in varying degrees of injury - torn ligaments playing tennis, broken ankles during football, repetitive strain injury and stress fractures in gymnastics - rugby seems to be the one that has the greatest risk of extreme life limiting injury (not including motorsport)

My DM was always anti rugby due to the injuries the boys at her school had.

We won’t let DS play rugby. He can play hockey if he wants a team sport. DH is still playing at 43 and has never had a bad injury. It’s also very friendly.

YANBU

one rule I’ve always had since having DS is no rugby, every single rugby boy/man I know has severe injuries.

My nephews are in hospital every other week after games, DHs friends all played and have serious injuries even as adults

its a big fat no

Those lessons aren’t much use to the players who have dementia in their 30s or 40s

Yes - but hey this is sport, the national obsession - let's not worry about the future.

I have a 8 year old DS, he plays under 9's and they have just started tackling this year.

He is the smallest kid on the field every weekend. He's a 25thnpercentile child, and is in size 7-8 clothes.

But ...he loves rugby, and enjoys the tackling and the game. Yes we've had a few bad knocks and a trip to a and e, but he enjoys it.

I mean I was a professional figure skater, I sustained multiple head knocks , broken ribs and a fractured tibia in my sport. All sport comes with risks.

Certainly there are incidences if injury in Rugby, the facts and figures are available, but the RFU categories them into injuries per playing hours.
But should we stop our children going out, cycling or driving cars when we look at the high incidents of road deaths/serious injuries in 2021for 16/24 age:

Cyclists 13/572
Pedestrians 35/647
Car occupants 141/ 2223
Motorcyclists 60/1490
Source =Brake Road safety charity.

I find this tricky too, I have two who play rugby and it does worry me especially as mine are small compared to their peers. Even at the younger end there are some pretty big sizes differences. I was glad when my eldest hated rugby but didn’t gamble on the other two loving it.