If your youth coach wants to practice headers...

[Grace T.]

I also think this is directly related to how we are coaching in the US. Remove boot ball and focus on decision making / possession like the rest of the world, much of this goes away. Soccer in the US is pretty abysmal even at the highest levels.

That’s not really true. I follow Sevilla regularly and you see the ball over the top attempted (not executed) at least 10 times per game. You see it even more in the epl. It doesn’t need to just come from a gk punt but as dad and I discussed From a mid chipping it over. Yeah Barcelona doesn’t do it as much…they prefer the thru on the ground which is much harder to execute.

the reason you see it more in the boys youth game is they don’t have three skills to counter it. The first is the drop and counter: 1 player moves to head the ball and 3 of the rest of the back line drop to cover (there’s a YouTube on this skill). Lower level teams struggle to even keep their back 4 unified. But what’s really hard is moving into this position in anticipation and it requires practice…my kid is 13 and I’ve only seen 1 boys team execute this in anticipation to shut down the other side from doing it…the lafc academy team…and even then the other side tries it because they figure the other side might not stop it

the second is the step command to force a striker waiting on a foot race into an offside position. At 13 the keepers on the more advanced side are still yelling “back” and sometimes being ignored by their back line. It requires a high tactical knowledge by both the defensive line and the keeper of where and most importantly when to step, as well as a full ref crew that’s decent to actually see the subtle off side

the final thing you need is a keeper to sweep and not withdraw prematurely to cover goal. It makes the area you can put balls over the top very small. Only about 1/2 the mls keepers my sons age are actually sweeping (it’s one of the last skills to be learned because there’s so much else, hard to practice, and many gk coaches don’t know how to coach it or assume the team coach will cover it). Of those 1/2 many are struggling with withdrawing prematurely to their line to cover goal v the space (keeper traumatic stress syndrome from all the balls banged over their heads when they were younger into goal).

I dont know if it gets better as they get older because we aren’t there yet. Maybe teams get better at the thru ball on the ground but it’s not as deadly because as I said most keepers my sons age are routinely practicing how to deal with those and all the gk camps cover it. If you want to get there quicker what you really need is academy style practices like they do in Europe: practice 5 days a week for several hours a day. But that would mean even more headers in practice so they don’t happen on the field. I can tell you from dear cousins experience, Spanish tiered rec has the same problem.

 

[Grace T.]

Btw the mls has new guidance to protect gks on the ground. There are 4 criteria but the most important is contact to the head by an attacker. It came into play in the la galaxy v Minnesota game. The punishment is the goal is disallowed and an automatic red card. The mls thought it was important to adopt for protecting gk from concussions

if the mls thinks it’s important the youth game should adopt it as well. The issue though is this means as a practical matter, without the benefit of var, if the ball is more under a goalkeepers control than the attacker and the gk is on the ground, the attacker can never challenge, including a rebound ball (as was the case in Galaxy v Minnesota) for fear of going down to 10.

soccer like basketball before the adoption of the shot clock is a very broken game (everything from pks to handballs to player safety). A header fix is likely to just break it even more.

 

[dad4]

What I don't get is the 80s were the peak "boot ball" era. Are we not seeing CTE cases from that time? It seems CTE is showing up for American football players pretty regularly. Can't we glean anything from that? Like I said early, I played CB and headed the ball regularly. I have no idea if I had proper form, but I certainly never saw stars.

Someone who was 20 in 1985 is only 57 now. Unless they died young like Scott Vermillion or Junior Seau, they have no CTE diagnosis.

CTE is diagnosed only posthumously, and only if you look for it. Mostly, we’d be seeing CTE cases from the NASL days, and those guys were almost all foreign players.

NASL also had slightly different rules. For a while, you could only be offside in the last 35 yards. Not sure what that did to header frequency, but it certainly alters the question of where you should position yourself for a goalie punt.

 

[espola]

Someone who was 20 in 1985 is only 57 now. Unless they died young like Scott Vermillion or Junior Seau, they have no CTE diagnosis.

CTE is diagnosed only posthumously, and only if you look for it. Mostly, we’d be seeing CTE cases from the NASL days, and those guys were almost all foreign players.

NASL also had slightly different rules. For a while, you could only be offside in the last 35 yards. Not sure what that did to header frequency, but it certainly alters the question of where you should position yourself for a goalie punt.

I liked the 35-yard offside line. Later on, I found out it was such a good idea that FIFA rejected its use anywhere else in the soccer world. I also learned about the 10-point standings system from NASL -- it was touted at the time as a way to avoid all those boring 1-0 scores.

 

[splat123]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/07/05/bruce-murray-dementia-cte

Former Clemson and USMNT player Bruce Murray is 56

 

[Grace T.]

Interesting video by Tifo Football and The Athletic on the impacts of changing the header rule. Their (albeit speculative...though there have been quite a few test matches in both youngers and adults at this point) conclusions were interesting. One of the big things to note is that corners will likely become a. much more dangerous, and b. much more worthless. Worthless because the goalkeeper will have (as the only one that can reach high) much more range and advantage to stop an aerial ball. Dangerous because the scramble would be for the ball by cleated players on the ground or trying to do bicycles (my own 2 cents noted in parens, but if you ban headers it seems you will likely also need to ban bicycle kicks). Another impact they note is that football players might get shorter. Finally, as has been pointed out in this thread, they note the chief impact isn't necessarily in the box but in the midfield, where most headers are played, from incidental control of the ball or from the defensive line having to head back balls over the top....the expected result is that you'll either have to have the defensive line sit way back (something people have traditionally complained makes for boring football) or (much like the U12 game in the US) you get a lot of footrace football.

 

[lafalafa]

Before at certain age say 10-11 the recommendation is to wait but after that is soccer header protocol says different:

Head Injuries - US Club Soccer Website

CONCUSSIONS AND HEAD INJURIES U.S. Soccer announced the U.S. Soccer Concussion Initiative, which provides guidelines that were implemented beginning in January 2016. US Club Soccer clarified the following implementation guidelines as it relates to concussion initiatives and heading for youth...

usclubsoccer.org

.

Yes CTE can be a problem for any athlete in a contact sport so you try to minimize risk. Using and practicing good technique will reduce the possibility of injury but it's not a zero risk game.

• Players in 11-U programs and younger shall not engage in heading, either in practices or in games.
• Limited heading in practice for players in 12-U and 13-U programs. More specifically, these players shall be limited to a maximum of 30 minutes of heading training per week, with no more than 15-20 headers per player, per week. There are no heading restrictions in games.
• Clubs should be aware of circumstances in which individual consideration is needed. For examples:
  • A 10 year old playing at 12-U or older should not head the ball at all.
  • An 11 or 12 year old playing at 14-U or older should abide by the heading restrictions in practice.

 

[Grace T.]

Before at certain age say 10-11 the recommendation is to wait but after that is soccer header protocol says different:

Head Injuries - US Club Soccer Website

CONCUSSIONS AND HEAD INJURIES U.S. Soccer announced the U.S. Soccer Concussion Initiative, which provides guidelines that were implemented beginning in January 2016. US Club Soccer clarified the following implementation guidelines as it relates to concussion initiatives and heading for youth...

usclubsoccer.org

.

Yes CTE can be a problem for any athlete in a contact sport so you try to minimize risk. Using and practicing good technique will reduce the possibility of injury but it's not a zero risk game.

Before at certain age say 10-11 the recommendation is to wait but after that is soccer header protocol says different:

Head Injuries - US Club Soccer Website

CONCUSSIONS AND HEAD INJURIES U.S. Soccer announced the U.S. Soccer Concussion Initiative, which provides guidelines that were implemented beginning in January 2016. US Club Soccer clarified the following implementation guidelines as it relates to concussion initiatives and heading for youth...

usclubsoccer.org

.

Yes CTE can be a problem for any athlete in a contact sport so you try to minimize risk. Using and practicing good technique will reduce the possibility of injury but it's not a zero risk game.

• Players in 11-U programs and younger shall not engage in heading, either in practices or in games.
• Limited heading in practice for players in 12-U and 13-U programs. More specifically, these players shall be limited to a maximum of 30 minutes of heading training per week, with no more than 15-20 headers per player, per week. There are no heading restrictions in games.
• Clubs should be aware of circumstances in which individual consideration is needed. For examples:
  • A 10 year old playing at 12-U or older should not head the ball at all.
  • An 11 or 12 year old playing at 14-U or older should abide by the heading restrictions in practice.

Some random observations of the little ones:

a. the 10-11 thing is an arbitrary number. My understanding is that it was as a result of a lawsuit settlement
b. one of the chief impact in the games is that you do see a lot of footraces. Ball over the top and then just have the fast player race it down. The goalkeepers can't defend 1v1 very well at that age so if you have a decent striker that knows not to shoot it at the keeper it becomes pretty easy.
c. Defensively, as a result a common tactic in the very youngers is that if your team is up 2 goals in a contested game, you just pull back your players to guard the goal (I even saw one team once pull back it's entire squad and just sit them in front of the goal...the game ended in a 1-1 tie because a handball call led to a penalty).
d. the impact of the ball over the top in the littlest ones is minimized because it's paired with the no punt rule and the GKs/defenders at that age realistically can't bang a ball over the top on goalkicks (you might get a boy that can do it once in a while, but it's not controlled or targeted).

 

[lafalafa]

Some random observations of the little ones:

a. the 10-11 thing is an arbitrary number. My understanding is that it was as a result of a lawsuit settlement
b. one of the chief impact in the games is that you do see a lot of footraces. Ball over the top and then just have the fast player race it down. The goalkeepers can't defend 1v1 very well at that age so if you have a decent striker that knows not to shoot it at the keeper it becomes pretty easy.
c. Defensively, as a result a common tactic in the very youngers is that if your team is up 2 goals in a contested game, you just pull back your players to guard the goal (I even saw one team once pull back it's entire squad and just sit them in front of the goal...the game ended in a 1-1 tie because a handball call led to a penalty).
d. the impact of the ball over the top in the littlest ones is minimized because it's paired with the no punt rule and the GKs/defenders at that age realistically can't bang a ball over the top on goalkicks (you might get a boy that can do it once in a while, but it's not controlled or targeted).

Yeah not sure how they came up with the age suggestions, full side or small side seems like it factors in or something?

I remember our family pediatrician suggesting to wait for full on tackle football w/ helmets until age 13 or 14 I can't recall which noting the skull is softer and not full development enough yet until that age.

One of my son's soccer coaches when he was younger was a ex pro that retired early due to a vertigo & concussion problem that keep repeating that he attributed to heading partly. Being a target forward, not heading was not a practical option for him.

 

[Zeke]

Some random observations of the little ones:

a. the 10-11 thing is an arbitrary number. My understanding is that it was as a result of a lawsuit settlement
b. one of the chief impact in the games is that you do see a lot of footraces. Ball over the top and then just have the fast player race it down. The goalkeepers can't defend 1v1 very well at that age so if you have a decent striker that knows not to shoot it at the keeper it becomes pretty easy.
c. Defensively, as a result a common tactic in the very youngers is that if your team is up 2 goals in a contested game, you just pull back your players to guard the goal (I even saw one team once pull back it's entire squad and just sit them in front of the goal...the game ended in a 1-1 tie because a handball call led to a penalty).
d. the impact of the ball over the top in the littlest ones is minimized because it's paired with the no punt rule and the GKs/defenders at that age realistically can't bang a ball over the top on goalkicks (you might get a boy that can do it once in a while, but it's not controlled or targeted).

At upper levels, you get kids who can accurately knock the ball a decent distance.

One of the recent tactics in 7v7 girls games is to have your strongest player try to chip the goalie on the kickoff. I’d say the hit rate is about as good as it is for direct free kicks.

 

[Grace T.]

At upper levels, you get kids who can accurately knock the ball a decent distance.

One of the recent tactics in 7v7 girls games is to have your strongest player try to chip the goalie on the kickoff. I’d say the hit rate is about as good as it is for direct free kicks.

I've seen it in the boys too...even 11v11 until they get high enough level that they're on a full sized/football field or until 14/15 when the goalkeepers are finally tall enough to stop balls over the head. Then there's the below.

The one rule I would like to see is make goals/penalties (with the GK able to move on the whistle)/DFKs worth 2 points, an unintentional handball PK/DFK 1, and a banger from about the circle 3. "Ronaldo for 3......yes!!!!" If they do implement a no headers rule, I think they would have to seriously look at going to this system with header PK/DFK worth 1. They'll also be some more stoppages because as we know there are balls to the face and it's hard to make your head "unnaturally bigger" so you'd have to distinguish between an intentional and nonintentional header, as they do in the US youngers game.