Football and Mental Health
ARTICLE BY MATTY
As we all know, Harvey Elliott recently suffered a horrific-looking injury against Leeds United.
Now, having seen the mentality that young Harvey possesses, I don’t think any of us are
worried about him making a full recovery. But, mentally, the trauma of a major injury like that
can stick with someone for years. Look at Jordan Henderson’s slow start to the season thus far
after his comeback from a groin tear. Look at Rhian Brewster after his ankle injury; he’s gone
from being the premier star of a star-studded academy destined for great success to a
Championship-level player. Look at the career of Daniel Sturridge, or even Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain after his host of injuries. But the mental health aspect of football goes far beyond
merely injuries and the mental hurdles associated with coming back from them. The cut-throat
nature of academies and the treatment of youth players in other academies is, quite frankly,
atrocious and should be condemned. Look at the story of Jeremy Wisten, who committed
suicide two weeks after being released by Man City’s academy at the age of 17. Youth players
are often signed and dropped with no hope of being picked up by another club. A career they
spent their entire lives working for, gone because some old fat scout deemed them no longer
up to standards. Other youth players fall down the ranks, such as the particular story of one
Moses Swaibu. Initially at Palace, he fell down the ranks until he ended up playing for Lincoln
City, where a former Premier League player, Delroy Facey, introduced him to match-fixing. That
earned Swaibu a prison sentence. Young people are vulnerable, and that vulnerability isn’t
recognized enough by teams. We are fortunate to support a team that isn’t quite as heartless
with their academy players.
A great example of that vulnerability in youth would be a close friend of mine, who told me less
than a week ago that he had been suicidal for the past 18 months. A school friend, he felt that
myself and a close mutual friend were the only people he could talk to about this. He said he
couldn’t even come to school some days because he’d feel like everyone was watching him,
waiting for him to crack. This feeling stemmed from having homosexual feelings in an all-boys
Jesuit school. He couldn’t tell anyone how he felt because, as soon as that word “homosexual”
came out, he’d be laughed at and no longer taken seriously. This feeling of dread was
exacerbated by a young boy that he held feelings for, feelings which my friend had never felt
before. That young boy, unfortunately, committed suicide as a sophomore in high school, a
mere 15 years old. So my friend’s mental state was a total wreck, and he needed my help to
bring him back. I tried, to the best of my abilities, to be there for him and to help him get out of
this suicidal state. And, more recently, it seems that he’s starting to make some progress. But
you can see that vulnerability playing a factor in football too, can’t you? In a sport dominated
by old white men, where certain feelings are ridiculed and criticized, youth players could
feasibly feel very restrained. It is again on the clubs to create a welcoming atmosphere in their
academies instead of an environment of exclusion. I guarantee that if my school was more
open to suggestions on mental health, we wouldn’t have had 6 suicides from either current
students or recent graduates during my four years in high school.
Of course, mental health issues in football don’t merely intersect during a player’s youth.
Mental disabilities linked to football can kill footballers when their playing days are long behind
them. Look at Jack Charlton, for example. A rock for over 20 years at the back of Leeds’
defense in their greatest days, Charlton’s cause of death in July 2020 was linked to dementia.
Dementia and CTE can occur from repeated head trauma, such as helmet-to-helmet hits in the
NFL or heading the ball in football. As usual, the brilliant minds at Tifo Football have an
excellent video on the subject of dementia and its rising impact on older footballers. Going
back to the 1966 World Cup final, Germany against England, two of the key figures in the lore
of that game were Ray Wilson and Helmut Haller. Both died of dementia as well. In fact, over
half of the England starters in the 1966 World Cup final have been diagnosed with some type of
brain damage. In the NFL, over 110 dead NFL players’ bodies were examined recently and all
but one had CTE which led to their death. In some cases, the CTE affects NFL players so badly
that they commit suicide, such as the death of Junior Seau in 2011. He was only 38 years old.
While a ban of heading from the game would be a bit too far, in this writer’s opinion, we must
be cognizant of the risks that these players, especially defenders, endure every single time they
smash the ball away with a header.
So what would be the best way moving forward to deal with football’s neglect of mental health
at multiple levels? Well, firstly, the youth academy structure has to change. Most young
footballers give up almost everything to pursue their dream of becoming a professional: time,
money, sometimes education. Releasing them when they’re 17 and haven’t got any skills to
make a proper living other than being a cashier, not to mention no longer having the ability to
afford university because they funneled all their money into an academy, is essentially
condemning them to a life of unfulfilled ambitions and a tough road ahead to become
financially solvent. Liverpool, once again, are a shining example of what a club should do with
their academy prospects. They recommend the players they release to other clubs, giving them
the chance to pursue dreams elsewhere. Look at Remi Savage, for example. Savage is now
thriving in League One after Liverpool helped him pick what club he wanted to go to. They
weren’t going to bring him back on a new contract, but they ensured he could find success
elsewhere. That’s what a club should do to its youth prospects: nurture them and allow them to
grow even if they aren’t with your club anymore. Leaving them with no options could lead to
more stories like Wisten. As for dealing with dementia? I think it’d be best if we kept heading in
the game, but brought it up slowly at higher youth levels. Once you’re 15 or 16, then you can
start to learn how to properly head the ball. Any younger than that would be dangerous as
brains are still forming during that time period. Even then, there’s inherent risk considering that
the human brain isn’t fully developed until the age of 25, but the risk wouldn’t be as high as it
currently is.
Lastly, there is the type of mental trauma that GDoc wanted me to write about in the first place:
returning from injury. I once again point to the NFL and the story of Andrew Luck. Luck was the
perfect quarterback: a leader in the locker room, blessed with brilliant strength and running
ability. His team wasted that brilliance by constantly letting him get beaten up by the
opposition, leading to numerous rehab sessions. A lacerated kidney, a separated shoulder, calf
and ankle injuries, concussions, a torn abdominal muscle, another shoulder surgery. Eventually,
Luck’s love of the game was sapped by the constant rehab and he decided to retire at the age
of 29. Rehab is not only long and arduous, but when more injuries keep coming? It makes it
harder to play and do what you love. I think one of the main reasons Joel Matip is playing as
well as he has is not only because he’s world-class, but also because he finally is having a
stretch of games without injury, which would naturally give a player more joy and confidence.
Jock posted something rather recently about Klopp and Sturridge, with Klopp saying that
Sturridge would only play when 100% fit. Sturridge may have been made of glass, but perhaps
that fear of getting injured again made him wary of playing as often as Klopp would’ve liked.
Look at Henderson this season, for example, winning only 38% of his duels this season after
winning more than double that figure last season. His mobility seems a bit more limited as well.
Perhaps he is just finding his form, or maybe he’s afraid of another crunching tackle resulting in
another injury, or another lung-busting run causing a strained muscle. He has looked much
better since the City game, though, so that might just be conjecture in a month or so. Ox and
Keita also serve as examples of continuous rehab sapping the energy and strength out of
players over time. Keita at least looks something like what we’d hoped to get when we signed
him, but Ox’s energy and his terrorizing runs at defense look like they left him after that horrific
leg injury.
This article was meant to cover a lot of things: how rehab from injury can affect the mental
health of a player, how youth players are vulnerable in terms of mental health, and how brain
damage from football has been linked to numerous deaths of former legends of the game itself.
I hope I did so in a fashion that, in a way, helps to show that football’s impacts are far beyond
the game itself in previously unimaginable ways
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