″ I didn’t remember having children, it was a fear of death

Harlequins striker Joe Marler, England rugby champion in 2020/21, is another player reporting the harmful consequences of headshots.

Just days after 41-year-old former Wales captain Ryan Jones revealed he had been diagnosed with a form of dementia caused by repetitive blows to the head, disturbing new testimony has now emerged from another footballer, rugby.

Joe Marler, who is also an international but with the England national team, said that shortly after he was hit in the head during a match he “didn’t remember having children”. The 32-year-old Harlequins star revealed the accident was “death scary” but continues to “bury his head in the sand” due to fears of concussion.

The potential medium- and long-term effects on athletes who receive repeated blows to the head is initially controversial and then accepted into American football (the relationship between the same blows and different forms of brain disease has been demonstrated, with league funding to former players affected), But it took some time to reach Europe. Football has shown some concern, through FIFA and national federations, with some even banning headshots at younger levels, but in rugby the topic has been more controversial, even due to the frequency and violence of clashes. head.

Returning to Marler and the report published yesterday, he noted that the aforementioned incident occurred a few years ago, when he lost consciousness while trying to intervene and only woke up in the physiotherapist’s office. Then the Harlequins wardrobe asked him if the woman had brought the kids to the playground and Marler admitted he didn’t know what he was talking about. He asked me: What about the boys? I replied: Excuse me?

The Englishman accepts that “concussions are part of rugby (“it’s a contact sport”), noting that memories are back.” Since then, I’ve ignored it and buried my head in the sand. And Joe Marler, whose wife Daisy was mad at him last season after he suffered another concussion, added the player, the more talk about him and the more visible it became in the sport,” she said, “No, I can’t stand this anymore. If you get hit in the head, you follow protocols and tell someone, because this is no longer just about you,” Marler said, clearly referring to the kids.