THE Scottish Football Association and Scottish Youth Football Association were today urged to limit how much youngsters are allowed to head the ball.

The family of Billy McNeill, the 1967 European Cup-winning Celtic captain, revealed at the weekend that “Cesar” has become the latest high-profile footballer of his generation to be diagnosed with early onset dementia.

They believe that repeatedly heading heavy leather balls during his playing days has contributed significantly to McNeill’s condition and would like further studies carried out into the effects of the practice.

Dr William Stewart, the lead neuropathologist at the Southern General Hospital in Glasgow, has been researching the impact of head injuries in sport for the last decade.

He stressed that there is anecdotal evidence which suggests footballers are a greater risk of dementia.

Dr Stewart feels that football must follow the lead of other mainstream sports – including American football, baseball and rugby union – and take action now to decrease the likelihood of players from suffering brain-related illnesses.

“We have to acknowledge there is some potential for risk there and, rather than banning the heading of the ball, just take the first step which is to reduce exposure,” he said.

“Reduce exposure in training, perhaps reduce exposure in games for young people.

“The Scottish Football Association and Scottish Youth Football Association, they are the professionals, the experts on the game of football, need to come up with a solution which they can see would reduce exposure to heading and to impact.

“In American football, the NFL, the governing body of a professional and high-level game, decided to take out contact training during the season while they are waiting to gather all the appropriate evidence.

“They accepted that professional American footballers week to week aren’t going to forget how to tackle each other and how to block. They don’t need to be exposing themselves to unnecessary head injuries and head impacts during the week while they are waiting for the game.

“In baseball, pitchers are recognised to get degenerative elbow problems as a result of what is presumed to be that repetitive pitching action. What baseball decided to do to prolong the careers of pitchers by introducing something called the pitch count.

“Pitchers can only pitch so many balls in any one session. That varies depending on age. Kids under 12, for example, are only allowed to pitch, say, 50 balls in one session. It goes up as they get older.

“What we need to do is take a safe and pragmatic view based on what is available to us. In a sense that is what rugby has done. Whilst they are gathering evidence on the risks of concussion in the sport, rugby has adopted a policy that all concussion is bad and must be treated seriously.

“Rugby in the past couple of months looked at the issues and has changed the way that rugby was policed. They have become much stricter on high tackles in an attempt to reduce head injuries.

“These measures are seen as a ‘we’re not quite clear what the problem is exactly, but here is a way to reduce the risk’. Maybe football needs to do something like that. Perhaps they need to say heading sessions only happen so many times a month or a season.

“These things will encourage parents to allow their kids to play the game because moves are being made to make the game safe, mitigate against the risk and allay these fears.”

An SFA spokesman said: "“The Scottish FA helped produce the first consensus guidelines for the management of concussion in the world.

“In addition, we educate from Sports First Aid at grassroots level, to the Advanced Pitchcare Course for doctors and physiotherapists at elite level and all international teams' medical staff.

“Regarding the specific aspect of heading, we work with partners at UK and world level to examine current scientific evidence.”