Niall Quinn has said that the Football Association of Ireland will look to ban heading for children under the age of 12 once they assess all the information.
The FAI’s interim Deputy Chief Executive was speaking in his role as a pundit for Virgin Media Sport before Tuesday’s Champions League Action.
Quinn was responding to questions after the FA, SFA and IFA announced on Monday said that they would be outlawing under 12s heading the football after a study in Scotland linked the sport to dementia.
“We don’t just want to have a chain reaction so we’ll look at it and probably follow orders, as it were.
“We’ve already contacted UEFA and they’ve said virtually what we’ve said. That they’re monitoring it and will come up with a policy of their own very quickly on this,” said Quinn.
Quinn made his Ireland debut against Iceland in 1986 and admitted that he fears he will be impacted by dementia when he said, “nobody headed the ball more than me when I was a young player.
“When you say that professional footballers who headed the ball a lot were three and a half times more likely to suffer from Alzheimers and illnesses like that, I personally get worried about it.
“So, I would take heed of it and I’m very, very aware of it. I hope I’m okay - very selfishly - but I hope players who played in my era are okay.
“It always appears to be guys 20 years older and they’re going to be coming around soon so I’m very very mindful that of and the second it’s the correct thing to do, we’ll do it,” Quinn said.
The FAI’s interim deputy chief executive is not the only ex-Ireland international to speak on the topic. Kenny Cunningham said on Tuesday’s OTB AM that he supported a ban on under 12s heading.
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