{"id":422271,"date":"2026-01-19T01:09:14","date_gmt":"2026-01-19T01:09:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/422271\/"},"modified":"2026-01-19T01:09:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-19T01:09:14","slug":"premier-league-leads-call-for-temporary-concussion-subtitues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/422271\/","title":{"rendered":"Premier League leads call for temporary concussion subtitues"},"content":{"rendered":"

Those in favour of temporary replacements suggest they will significantly improve the immediate management of concussive injuries and ensure medical teams have sufficient time to assess players. <\/p>\n

The Premier League is ready to meet with Ifab to discuss the issue and would also share data, knowledge and learnings with both the international board and Fifa.<\/p>\n

It is hoped Ifab carries the idea forward to its annual general meeting in Cardiff on 28 February, where trials could potentially get final approval.<\/p>\n

Despite Ifab’s insistence permanent substitutions are the safest method, many leagues and unions have consistently been against them. <\/p>\n

Fifpro and the PFA first raised their opposition to Ifab’s trials when they began in 2021<\/a>. <\/p>\n

In 2022 the PFA insisted, external<\/a> temporary substitutes would “allow for medical staff to conduct more detailed and lengthy checks of the potentially injured player away from the field of play”.<\/p>\n

A joint application by a group of leagues was rejected at Ifab’s AGM in March 2023. The Premier League said it was “disappointed”<\/a> and “all available scientific evidence” was being ignored. <\/p>\n

Months after that rejection, Fifpro underlined its position, external<\/a> on temporary substitutes, citing evidence from the British Journal of Sports Medicine that the evaluation of concussions on athletes should take at least 10-15 minutes. <\/p>\n

The Premier League’s letter to Ifab includes recent research which shows between 27% and 53% of players diagnosed with a concussion are not immediately replaced.<\/p>\n

In other sports, the use of temporary substitutes has seen a marked reduction in the number of players returning to play who were later diagnosed with a concussion. <\/p>\n

In rugby union the number fell from 58% to 8%, while in American football’s NFL fewer than 2% of players went back on to the field.<\/p>\n

The Premier League will tell Ifab there is no logical reason to ignore temporary replacement trials and, if rejected, detailed rationale must be supplied. <\/p>\n

A regulatory framework has been developed to ensure substitutions are not misused by teams to gain a competitive advantage.<\/p>\n

The opposition team would be given an additional substitution, while video footage of all incidents would be reviewed by an oversight group to establish whether they were legitimate.<\/p>\n

Fifa president Gianni Infantino previously said the decision to reject a trial for temporary replacements had been taken to prioritise players’ health and ensure “zero risk” in such scenarios.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Those in favour of temporary replacements suggest they will significantly improve the immediate management of concussive injuries and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":422272,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-422271","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422271","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=422271"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422271\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/422272"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=422271"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=422271"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=422271"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}