No, according to a study conducted by the Sahlgrenska Academy of the University of Gothenburg (Sweden). A few years ago, researchers from the center led by the neurochemist Henrik Zetterberg analyzed a series of chemical markers present in the cerebrospinal fluid that surrounds the brain and spinal cord of 20 amateur soccer players after hitting the ball several times with the head during a week of training. And they found that there was no sign of trauma . "When nerves and supporting cells in the brain are damaged, they release several proteins that can be detected in spinal fluid, but in our experiment we found none," explains Zetterberg.
His work showed that even hitting the ball with the head 20 times there is no evidence of trauma. This is good news considering that "in a normal game, the six heads to the ball are normally not exceeded", points out the researcher, who published the results of the study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine .
