Report finds concussion most common injury in AIL and schoolboy Senior Cup

Concussion was the most common injury suffered by male players in All-Ireland League and schoolboy Senior Cup rugby. In the Women’s All Ireland League ankle sprains were the most prevalent with brain injury second.

The IRFU and the University of Limerick released data on Thursday from the Irish Research Injury Surveillance (IRIS) research project which examined injury incidence in the men’s and women’s All-Ireland League during the 2021-2022 season.

They also produced a focused two-year analysis of schoolboy Senior Cup surveillance for 2018-2020, authored by Dr Therese Leahy. Due to Covid-19-related player and staff absences during the 2021/22 season, limited schoolboy data was collected for this season.

The club data were compiled by Patrick Dolan across 430 matches (versus 388 for 2019/20) from 21 men’s All-Ireland League and women’s All-Ireland League clubs.

The Counter Ruck: the rugby newsletter from The Irish Times

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In the schools game, data from 220 matches at Senior Cup level were recorded. A total of 709 male, 129 female players were registered with the IRIS project for the 2021/22 season, and 339 schoolboy players for the 2018-2020 seasons.

The findings stated that 53 per cent (down from 56) of match and training injuries are as a result of the tackle and that 61 per cent of tackle-related injuries are sustained by the ball carrier with the tackler the injury party in 39 per cent of cases.

The study found that a male player will get injured every 14 matches, women every 25 and schoolboys every 16 matches. The comprehensive reports and their findings are available on www.irishrugby.ie.

Meanwhile, World Rugby confirmed that the Under-20 Junior World Championship will be staged for the first time since 2019 this summer. The tournament takes place in Cape Town and Richie Murphy Ireland’s side have been drawn against England, Australia and Fiji at the pool stage of the competition.

Ireland begin their campaign on Saturday, June 24th against England at the Paarl Gynasium (12.30), five days later they face Australia on Thursday, June 29th at the same venue (10.0am) before concluding their pool campaign on Tuesday, July 4th (12.30), once again in Paarl.

All teams will play a further two matches depending on standings on Sunday, July 9th with the finals taking place on Friday, July 14th. The Irish team open their Six Nations campaign against Wales at Colwyn Bay next Friday (7.15).

Munster have announced that academy manager Ian Costello will take up a new role as head of rugby operations at the end of this season. Costello will oversee the long-term strategic development of the elite player pathway, succession planning, and provide recruitment support for developing, retaining, and recruiting players in conjunction with the head coach, Graham Rowntree.