FORMER TV newsman Mike Edwards has joined forces with the families of famous footballers who died from dementia – to lobby for headers to be banned from football by 2030.
The reporter, who worked for STV for over quarter of a century, has teamed up with the daughter of the late Scottish football manager Ally MacLeod along with the widow of Manchester Utd fave Frank Kopel, who both died from dementia.
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He has also enlisted helped from John Stiles, the son of 1966 England World Cup winner Nobby Stiles, who passed away in 2020 aged 78 as a result of chronic traumatic encephalopathy from the repeated heading of footballs.
And after Scotland has qualified for the second Euros in a row, Mike has set an ambitious target of stopping headers entirely for the 2030 World Cup.
He says: “Heading the ball is a slow but steady killer.
“We should build on the momentum of Scotland appearing on Europe’s biggest footballing stage to put pressure on FIFA and UEFA to look again at changing the rules.
“I’d like to see heading banned altogether after the 2030 World Cup. Not heading the ball will save lives.”
The Inverness Caley Thistle supporter has been a footie fan all his life and became a dementia campaigner after he left STV five years ago to look after his mum Margaret, who suffered from Alzhemier’s Disease before passing away at the age of 91 in 2019.
And that’s why he’s fighting on behalf of the titans of the game including Celtic legend Billy McNeill and Scotland hero Gordon McQueen who passed away from early onset dementia, most likely brought on from decades of heading a football.
That’s after academic research by Glasgow Uni in 2021 discovered that footballers are three and a half times more likely to receive a diagnosis of a neuropathological disease like dementia.
That rises to five times more likely if they were a defender like McNeill and McQueen.
Mike says: “We don’t need to head the ball to play good football.
“All the great teams from the Dutch International sides to Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City all play the ball on the ground.”
Inverness-born Mike, 58, recently added Amanda Kopel to the lobby group Heading Out, whose hubby Frank died in 2014 at aged 65, just four years after being diagnosed with vascular dementia.
Amanda relentlessly lobbied The Scottish Government to introduce Frank’s Law, which from 2019 provided free personal care for anyone who needs it regardless of their age or illness.
Meanwhile, ICU nurse Gail Pirie has also signed up after her dad Ally MacLeod – who managed Scotland for the 1978 World Cup – died in 2004, aged 72, after a long battle with Alzheimer’s disease.
Mike has already met representatives of the European governing body UEFA but has failed to set up talks with the international chiefs at FIFA.
He says: “People in charge of the game worry that new rules will ruin the sport, but look at all the changes we’ve had in recent years from the pass back rule to VAR for goodness sake.
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“Banning heading the ball will only enhance the game – after all it’s called football, not head ball.”
*For more information on Heading Out visit headingout.scot