{"id":331462,"date":"2025-12-06T21:52:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-06T21:52:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/331462\/"},"modified":"2025-12-06T21:52:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-06T21:52:10","slug":"rlpa-player-poll-reveals-new-concussion-reporting-statistics-clint-newton-comments-reaction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/331462\/","title":{"rendered":"RLPA player poll reveals new concussion reporting statistics; Clint Newton comments, reaction"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>RLPA boss <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nine.com.au\/person\/clint-newton-25fj\" class=\"Link-styles__Wrapper-sc-b307e8cd-0 cqBmwR\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Clint Newton<\/a> has admitted the statistics surrounding <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nine.com.au\/topic\/concussion-25fw\" class=\"Link-styles__Wrapper-sc-b307e8cd-0 cqBmwR\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">concussion<\/a> reporting among NRL players is &#8220;incredibly concerning&#8221; following a recent poll.<\/p>\n<p>According to data published in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.smh.com.au\/sport\/nrl\/incredibly-concerning-players-covering-up-concussions-at-training-poll-reveals-20251206-p5nld7.html\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"Link-styles__Wrapper-sc-b307e8cd-0 cqBmwR\">The Sydney Morning Herald<\/a>, an estimated 60 per cent of male players have continued training after suffering a concussion.<\/p>\n<p>The poll revealed that one in three male players didn&#8217;t report concussion symptoms they had experienced at training, while two thirds of male players players continued to train after suffering a suspected concussion.<\/p>\n<p>READ MORE: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nine.com.au\/sport\/motorsport\/f1-news-2025-abu-dhabi-grand-prix-qualifying-max-verstappen-pole-position-lando-norris-oscar-piastri-results-20251207-p5nlgo.html\" class=\"Link-styles__Wrapper-sc-b307e8cd-0 cqBmwR\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Verstappen takes &#8216;insane&#8217; pole to set up thrilling decider<\/a><\/p>\n<p>READ MORE: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nine.com.au\/sport\/football\/premier-league-news-2025-liverpool-draw-leeds-united-results-video-chelsea-bournemouth-20251207-p5nlgx.html\" class=\"Link-styles__Wrapper-sc-b307e8cd-0 cqBmwR\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Liverpool woes continue after dramatic 96th-minute goal<\/a><\/p>\n<p>READ MORE: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nine.com.au\/sport\/cricket\/the-ashes-second-test-2025-england-zak-crawley-ollie-pope-marcus-trescothick-press-conference-20251206-p5nlg8.html\" class=\"Link-styles__Wrapper-sc-b307e8cd-0 cqBmwR\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">England confirms &#8216;no discussions&#8217; took place over costly habit<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The league is attempting to crack down on head knocks suffered away from the field and the new report comes in the wake of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nine.com.au\/sport\/nrl\/news-2025-eli-katoa-ruled-out-2026-season-medical-update-20251118-p5ngfk.html\" class=\"Link-styles__Wrapper-sc-b307e8cd-0 cqBmwR\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Eliesa Katoa&#8217;s devastating brain injury suffered during the Pacific Championships that has placed his career in jeopardy<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>While the vast majority (95 per cent) of both male and female players are confident in the steps being taken around concussions, Newtown is worried by the numbers.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Eli Katoa is assisted by trainers after copping a brutal knock to the head by a teammate.\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/c8501091f0f060e291b8b50803ab20251d3c9530.jpeg\"  width=\"100%\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"d40ab0ad209f9332-text d40ab0ad209f9332-body-2\" style=\"--text-color:var(--color-text-secondary)\">Eli Katoa\u00a0NRL Imagery<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The concussion data from our players is incredibly concerning, particularly because it has worsened year on year,&#8221; the RLPA chief executive said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We can point to various reasons for this, but based on these recent results, you can make a strong case that we are still not empowering players enough.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We know rugby league is a combative, highly competitive sport and requires you to push yourself to the extreme. However, as a game, we need to do more to ensure we are creating professional, high-performance environments that can improve the detection of concussions at training and genuinely empower players.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It will remain a damaging blind spot for the safety of our players and the game more broadly if we don&#8217;t make necessary improvements.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>One NRL player reported four suspected concussions within a 12-month period whilst at training, while one female reported three in the same time period.<\/p>\n<p>The other key takeaway from the player poll is that 51 per cent of the game is now made up of Pacific Island players.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"RLPA boss Clint Newton has admitted the statistics surrounding concussion reporting among NRL players is &#8220;incredibly concerning&#8221; following&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":331463,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-331462","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331462","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=331462"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331462\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/331463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=331462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=331462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=331462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}