with the greatest of respect to Jeff Astle's family, life is about risks.... http://news.sky.com/story/1316069/heading-footballs-not-safe-for-children
Yes, but there are situations where children are get involved, voluntarily or through parental / peer pressure, in situations where they don't understand the nature or level of risk involved. In the case of children heading footballs it largely depends on the weight of the ball involved, in the same way that the potential damage to a modern footballer's brain is much less than it was than in the days when leather footballs were uncoated and on wet days became heavier as play progressed.
I absolutely agree about the peer pressure bit and children must not be forced to do something they do not want to do. It must only be fun at their age, and when i was a young lad, i rarely saw the necessity to head a ball...hence my motto in old age of keeping the ball on the ground. However, i feel the story starts to get slightly clouded throughout varied media reports when we bring in the Astle aspect imo. If we want to look at the pressure on young children at grass roots level lets just do that, sadly i have fears like everything in the modern game, like the the athletic requirements, the water breaks, the artificial pitches, next it will be head shields for all players, eventually it will be called American Football. Ok, as always by my nature a bit over exaggerated by me, but as i always say one rule leads to another and i just wonder where this is all going. I hasten to add, i'm not saying head shields should not be worn, we have already seen examples of this for the Chelsea keeper Petr Cech, i've no problem with that, but i just don't want to see us wrapping everything up in cotton wool, when common sense can be applied, especially at a young age.
