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Premiership Rugby to ramp up concussion surveillance with new 2019/20 matchday initiative
By Online Editors
Premiership Rugby's new 2019/20 season initiative will see independent matchday doctors in place at all Gallagher Premiership Rugby, Premiership Rugby Cup and European home matches.
This initiative – funded by the 13 member clubs - has the support of the key stakeholders in English Rugby – Premiership Rugby, the RFU, the RPA and World Rugby.
The role of the matchday doctor is to be responsible for decisions on matchday regarding a replacement for blood and head injuries. As part of their role they oversee the implementation of the head injury assessment and will work in collaboration with team doctors and medical staff to support head injury decision making during the match.
Why are we bringing them in?
Player welfare is right at the top of the agenda and Premiership Rugby believes this is the next stage, building on from the introduction of Hawkeye – to help ensure the identification of head injuries on the pitch – and to support the head injury assessment process.
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Independent match day doctors have been operating on the international stage for a long time and therefore this will bring the domestic game in England closer in line with best practice and the international standard.
It is hoped the initiative will take some pressure off the team doctors. The introduction of independent matchday doctors means there will be another set of eyes and ears for them to collaborate with when it comes to their decision making around head injuries.
It gives the capacity to undertake more simultaneous head injury assessments (HIA) on players. At the moment there is a 10-minute minimum and maximum amount of time for the HIA to take place. If two or even three HIAs occur at the same time, it is a running clock and Premiership Rugby will now have the ability with more hands-on deck to handle multiple HIAs.
How will it work?
For the 2019-20 season in all Gallagher Premiership Rugby, Premiership Rugby Cup and European home matches there will be: a team doctor, an immediate care doctor (appointed by the home team) who is there to support and undertake emergency care and a matchday pitch-side video reviewer (MPVR) who sits near the pitch reviewing the match through the Hawkeye system, and to aid decision making.
In addition, now there will also be an independent matchday doctor who will sit with the matchday pitch-side video reviewer and the Hawkeye technician close to pitchside and will be able to keep his eyes on the match. Together as a team, they will look after head injury management of players.
The decision as to whether a head injury assessment is required and subsequently if a player can return to play sits with the independent matchday doctor. However, it will always be a collaborative and supportive process. All decisions will be made in discussion with the team doctors who know the players well and will be able to share these experiences and insights with the matchday doctor. They will always review the video together.
In terms of who carries out the HIA, there are a couple of options. In the pre-match meeting, the team doctor will decide if they carry out the HIA with the matchday doctor observing or if they delegate to the independent matchday doctor. In either case in terms of the decision about whether the player returns to play this will always be a discussion and a collaboration between the team doctor and matchday doctor.
“This new initiative continues the evolution of our player welfare strategy, following on from the introduction of the head injury assessment and our use of the Hawkeye system to help better identify injuries during matches,” said Matt Cross, Premiership Rugby’s research and development manager.
“Our clubs are at the forefront of the latest player welfare initiatives and with us, will continue to drive world-class standards in the care of our players.”
WATCH: The RugbyPass documentary Knocked sees players, referees, medics and the sport's bodies give a unique insight into concussion and what is being done to combat it
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Latest Comments
The boy needs to bulk up if wants to play 10 or 11 to handle those hits, otherwise he could always make a brilliant reserve for the wings if he stays away from the stretcher.
Go to commentsIn another recent article I tried to argue for a few key concept changes for EPCR which I think could light the game up in the North.
First, I can't remember who pointed out the obvious elephant in the room (a SA'n poster?), it's a terrible time to play rugby in the NH, and especially your pinnacle tournament. It's been terrible watching with seemingly all the games I wanted to watch being in the dark, hardly able to see what was going on. The Aviva was the only stadium I saw that had lights that could handle the miserable rain. If the global appeal is there, they could do a lot better having day games.
They other primary idea I thuoght would benefit EPCR most, was more content. The Prem could do with it and the Top14 could do with something more important than their own league, so they aren't under so much pressure to sell games. The quality over quantity approach.
Trim it down to two 16 team EPCR competitions, and introduce a third for playing amongst the T2 sides, or the bottom clubs in each league should simply be working on being better during the EPCR.
Champions Cup is made up of league best 15 teams, + 1, the Challenge Cup winner. Without a reason not to, I'd distribute it evenly based on each leauge, dividing into thirds and rounded up, 6 URC 5 Top14 4 English. Each winner (all four) is #1 rank and I'd have a seeding round or two for the other 12 to determine their own brackets for 2nd, 3rd, and 4th. I'd then hold a 6 game pool, home and away, with consecutive of each for those games that involve SA'n teams. Preferrably I'd have a regional thing were all SA'n teams were in the same pool but that's a bit complex for this simple idea.
That pool round further finalises the seeding for knockout round of 16. So #1 pool has essentially duked it out for finals seeding already (better venue planning), and to see who they go up against 16, 15,etc etc. Actually I think I might prefer a single pool round for seeding, and introduce the home and away for Ro16, quarters, and semis (stuffs up venue hire). General idea to produce the most competitive matches possible until the random knockout phase, and fix the random lottery of which two teams get ranked higher after pool play, and also keep the system identical for the Challenge Cup so everthing is succinct. Top T2 side promoted from last year to make 16 in Challenge Cup
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