Incidence of Injury in Gaelic Football

Abstract

These findings illustrate injury patterns in Gaelic football using a prospective methodology, over 4 consecutive seasons. Comparison with published literature suggests that Gaelic football match play injury risk is greater than soccer but less than rugby union.

Epidemiology of injury in male adolescent Gaelic games

“…This trend is also reported in adult Gaelic games 1,5,12 and other adolescent sports 20,21 and is attributed to the higher intensity, physicality and effort in a competitive match. 1,5 Adolescent players had a similar training injury rate as adolescent Gaelic footballers observed by Watson 13 (3.1 per 1000 h). Adolescent Gaelic footballers presented with a higher match injury rate than high school soccer players (7.2 injuries per 1000 h).…”

“…30 Midfielders were found to have the highest injury proportion in adolescent footballers and hurlers, which is similar to adult Gaelic footballers. 5 Midfielders are required to cover large portions of the field, jump and catch high balls repeatedly and are expected to both defend and attack during the match, thus they are placed under a higher level of intensity and physicality than other playing positions. 3 Foul play was more frequent in adolescent Gaelic football than hurling, but was still less than half of what was previously reported in adolescent Gaelic footballers (34.8%) by Watson in 1996.…”

“…4 Essential movements include sprinting, tackling, kicking, soloing (kicking the ball to yourself when running), shouldering (shoulder to shoulder charge), jumping, turning and catching. 5 Hurling on the other hand is similar to shinty, lacrosse or field hockey and participants use a stick called a hurley to hit a small, hard leather ball (sliotar). 2 Movements essential to hurling include sprinting, catching, striking (throwing the sliotar into the air and hitting it using the hurley), shouldering, blocking the sliotar with the hurley, soloing (running while keeping the sliotar balanced or bouncing on the hurley) and hooking (using the hurley to prevent the opposition swinging their hurley to hit the sliotar).…”

“…6,7 The trauma, pain and loss of function accompanying injury can be substantially detrimental to the participant, by preventing sports participation or negatively affecting performance. 5,8 However, the occurrence and magnitude of the effects of many injuries may be reduced with the implementation of injury prevention strategies. 7,9 The initial step to prevent injury is to establish the incidence of injury in the sport.…”

“…Not only do these studies vary in their research design, study length, definition of injury and reporting procedures, they also have primarily focused on elite adult players. 5,11,12 In fact, no epidemiological data is available on adolescent hurling injuries and only a single study has been published on adolescent Gaelic footballers. 13 In addition, it is relatively common for adolescents to play both Gaelic football and hurling.…”