TAKE CARE: Ersel Kizilay, a Taradale Masters football player, says teams need to be more aware of injuries to players on the field. PHOTO / Warren Buckland
TAKE CARE: Ersel Kizilay, a Taradale Masters football player, says teams need to be more aware of injuries to players on the field. PHOTO / Warren Buckland
THE death of a social competitive footballer in June has prompted his Napier team to call for a heightened state of awareness of injuries on the field.
Taradale Masters player Ersel Kizilay says there's even room for pre-emptive measures to avoid serious injuries and fatalities after teammate Ronnie Cornish died on June 5, the morning after taking a head knock in a 3pm match against Havelock North SAS at Taradale Park.
"We need to think about the dangers of what can happen because, at the end of the day, we have families and we've all got to get up to go to work the next day," Kizilay says.
"We need to have some awareness of the physical attention around football and challenges that are thrown in," says the 46-year-old health and safety consultant from Napier.
Cornish, who returned to Napier from Australia in February, got injured during a third-grade men's league game.
The 41-year-old, who worked as an oil rigger in Darwin, was playing against Havelock North SAS when he suffered a head collision with an opponent during an aerial battle.
Cornish stayed on the ground for a while and a teammate on the sidelines ran up with some water for him but minutes later he carried on playing, going on to score two goals and was named man of the match.
He went to the clubrooms for aftermatch drinks but complained he wasn't feeling well.
"He said he was having headaches and had vomited," says Kizilay, adding that teammates had offered to take him home but he declined the offers.
When he got to his parents' house, Gwenda and John, where he was living, he had told them he was feeling hot and cold and had a throbbing headache, so they kept an eye on him.
"He didn't wake up the next morning," says Kizilay, adding the suddenness of Cornish's death left everyone in shock.
Kizilay and Taradale Masters players dispute an autopsy report that said heart issues were the cause of death."We don't believe that would be the case. We effectively thought it's the head collision that would have caused it.
"The medical professionals and specialists thought it might be an unrecognised or undiagnosed heart disease that would have caused it.
"I don't think anyone with a heart disease would have vomited the night before and then after, before passing away."
Kizilay accepts that physicality in any sport is a given.
"We probably need some assistance from the referees on consistency in the control of the game and some knowledge of what can go wrong, to be honest."
The blend of young and older players suits the Taradale Masters team but he says he believes a grade for Masters players can be up for discussion.
To a certain extent concussion cases may be overlooked in social competitive grades, Kizilay says.
"We look at the causes and how we manage it so there'll be an emergency plan when there's a particular situation where there's a head collision, severe or not so severe, we take precautions."
Messages should be sent to players' families and, should the need arise, have the injured person transferred to hospital immediately.
"We need to take a practical approach where, if we see a friend has had a collision with the body or head, then we need to be a little more alert around them.
"We need to ask them the right questions and do the right things."
Kizilay also understands in some situations players are reluctant to leave the field and require persuasion from several teammates to take a break for assessment.
He is an advocate of "what happens on the field stays on the field" and feels there should be no vindictiveness around it.
"The challenges we see on a day-to-day basis on the football pitches are done with a spirited approach and people want to win, so sometimes that competitiveness comes out as an aggressive approach but I think everyone needs to take that into their equation and think about the consequences of that."
Kizilay says in no way is he or the team implying the Havelock North player was reckless but they suspect that collision may have contributed to the injury.
"Those things happen on the field. In 99.9 per cent of cases they will stand up and walk away from it.
"All I'm saying is there's a potential for injury or fatality if we're not careful. We know there was no malicious intent."
Cornish had an infectious rapport with not only his teammates but anyone he interacted with.
Ronnie Cornish, 41, who died the morning after his third division social club soccer match for Taradale Masters on June 4.
"He was a cheeky person, very nice friend of ours and full of life. Everybody in the team instantaneously liked him. He was like everyone's best friend," Kizilay says.
Cornish, a former age-group player, also played in Gisborne.
"He played rugby in his heyday and he was a king surfer," he says."He was very social, active and sporty individual and everyone in our team just loved him."
The impact of his sudden loss had left the team postponing three of games as well as miss training sessions.
A fundraiser to increase awareness of such injuries and help the Cornish family has so far collected $8000.
The team is holding a "Ronnie Cornish 'Cheeky' Quiz Night Fundraiser" on Thursday from 6pm to 9.30pm.
It costs $10 a person and includes food at the Omarunui Bowling Club in Napier.
The target is to raise more than $10,000 which will go towards helping his four children, Skylah, Kayla, Taine and Louise, with schooling and other needs in Gisborne.
Ronnie Cornish, 41, who died the morning after his third division social club soccer match for Taradale Masters on June 4. Here with his daughters, Kayla (left) and Louise.
On October 8, Taradale Masters will host a memorial match in Cornish's honour where his former Gisborne team will be the opposition.
The two sides met during the funeral in June and agreed to put up a trophy in Cornish's memory. His children and former partner Tracey Hayward will be there.
Kizilay thanked the many businesses and organisations which have donated items for the fundraiser.
They include Colin Micheal Stewart for funding most of the raffle and prizes, Anaru Dingo Donnelly (Dingo) for selling more than 250 tickets, Peter Foot, Tony Bestel, Darrell Hart and Pete Young (Gordy).
Kizilay says Church Road Winery, Mission Winery, Elephant Hill Winery, Taradale Quality Meets, Bay Espresso, the Taradale Masters team and the Taradale community got behind the fundraiser, too.
Central Football operations and game development manager Darren Mason says what happened to Cornish was a tragedy and he will be sorely missed and the federation had visited the club to offer condolences to the team and his family.
Mason says they have received a report from referee Darren Austin, a highly qualified official who didn't see anything untoward in the game.
The football body didn't want to enter into autopsy report discussions because they weren't medical experts.
"We do not support any aggression but players need to take responsibility, first and foremost, and the buck stops right there," he says, adding refs can sanction bad behaviour after a match can't prevent it.
Players, Mason emphasises, need to be fit to play football and not come to play in the hope of becoming fit as they often carried on to not let the team down.
"You can go for a 5km run and if you're tired you can stop but in football game there might be no subs and you feel you need to carry on."
Clubs often offered their designated refs who did a fantastic job so that also had to be put in perspective with player responsibility.
Refs can send off players but he says why should players "clatter" into each other in a social division anyway.
Mason says NZ Football was in the process of setting up a concussion policy, similar to rugby, where teams and officials can identify victims and follow necessary steps to ensure their safety is paramount.
