Patrick McKendry: The shocking brain-injury detail World Rugby don't seem to grasp

OPINION

Sometimes it takes confronting news hitting close to home to bring a global issue into sharp relief, be it rising sea levels or a former All Black suffering early-onset dementia at the age of 41 – indeed, in this case, a household name in Carl Hayman.

And so it seems appropriate to suggest the rise in former players complaining about serious brain injuries is rugby's equivalent of the climate emergency in that it's something that must be immediately addressed in a meaningful way and changes not only promised but acted on. It's probably not overstating things to say the long-term future of the game depends on it.

That Hayman, as revealed in Dylan Cleaver's The Bounce, is joining a 150-member group of former players in a suit against the game's governing bodies, including World Rugby, will hopefully focus minds everywhere and not only in New Zealand, because the 45-test tighthead prop, who played about 450 first-class games over 17 years, was considered the best in the world for a long time and the detail in Cleaver's piece this week was shocking and potentially damning.

Hayman is "100 per cent" sure that rugby is to blame for his predicament.

Among other things, Hayman's agony at forgetting his son's middle name at one point when required to give it over the phone will strike at the heart of all parents, but the other aspect which hit home was the reminder of how much rugby many elite players are forced to endure each year; 10 months' worth.

The comparison was made to NFL, which has had to confront the same head injury issues and is some way ahead of rugby in this regard – and those players are on the clock for only a fraction of the time.

As Cleaver reports Hayman as saying: "I look at the NFL again and they have a 17-game season across four to five months with the possibility of a couple of playoff games. You compare that to rugby with a 10-month season.

"There needs to be a discussion about what constitutes an acceptable volume of rugby."

He's right and now the question is, as (some) world leaders meet in Glasgow to discuss the climate emergency at COP26 and set various targets which may or may not be met in the distant future, what is World Rugby going to do about its own emerging crisis?

Because, at the top level, tinkering with tackle heights and flashing red cards for contact with the head is the easy bit compared with how many games players are expected to be available for – and that's not even considering the training that goes with it.

Captain Carl Hayman talks to the media during the European Rugby Champions Cup Press Conference at Twickenham Stadium. Photo / Getty Images.

Due to the competing interests of clubs and nations, a potential global season, the promised land in which quality is celebrated over quantity and all test matches are part of a mechanism – all wheels turning in the same direction driving support, revenue and perhaps most significantly, meaning - is continually put in the too-hard basket or ignored completely.

There is a hope that private equity's encroachment into the game will bring changes to this via its financial power and reliance on utter pragmatism, but surely some leadership from the game's administrators right now is not too much to ask for.

These should be uncomfortable times for those in charge of the game because they and the game are vulnerable on two fronts. The more former players with Hayman's profile that speak out on their brain injuries, the more parents will be reluctant to allow their sons and daughters to play it, at least in its current form.

The game has changed in the six years since Hayman stopped playing. Laws have been strengthened to make contact with the head a far more serious and punishable offence. Attitudes have changed. There is an increasing focus, at least in my experience, on coaching children how to tackle as safely as possible (most head injuries are suffered by the tackler) and thankfully the old three-week stand down for any concussion, no matter how serious, has long been consigned to the bin.

But the nettle World Rugby won't or can't grasp is the lack of a global season, and it must before the rising heat makes it wilt entirely.