Nobody in football has done more than PFA to find link to dementia - chief Gordon

Professional Footballers' Association chief executive Gordon Taylor believes no other football organisation in the world has done more to look for a possible link between heading the ball and brain injuries.

The players' union has come in for fierce criticism in recent weeks for its perceived failure to take the issue of ex-players suffering from dementia and related illnesses seriously enough.

Former England and West Brom forward Jeff Astle died from a degenerative brain disease called chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) in 2002, with the coroner listing the cause of death as an "industrial disease".

Astle's daughter Dawn angrily walked out of a meeting with Taylor in a recent BBC documentary because she felt he was refusing to answer her questions on why the PFA had not made more progress in 15 years, while Astle's widow Laraine told the Daily Telegraph he had "failed" and should quit.

Former Blackburn, Celtic, Chelsea and England striker Chris Sutton - whose father Mike, a former player, suffers from dementia - also told the newspaper the PFA was "letting down our heroes of the past as well as players of the present and future" by not trying harder to fix what he called a "national disgrace".

But Taylor, who played more than 550 league games for five clubs between 1962 and 1980, told Press Association Sport this criticism is "unfair".

"I don't know of another football organisation anywhere in the world that has done more than us? If you do, please tell me," the 72-year-old said.

"I don't think there's a sports organisation that has done as much as us."

On Thursday, the Football Association and PFA announced they were inviting applications for independent research into the issue, with both organisations understood to be pledging six-figure sums to the project.

Pointing to the fact dementia is now the UK's top killer and a growing issue for every developed economy as people are living longer, Taylor said the issue goes beyond football.

"The rest of the world has struggled to get to grips with this, not just us. There is no magic key," said Taylor.

"I feel very offended when people accuse us of a cover-up and say we don't want to know about the health risks. We do.

"Look at how we've responded to previous problems. The game was on its knees in the 1980s because of safety issues but we played our part in overcoming that.

"It's personally quite hurtful to hear people saying we don't care. My mother had dementia. I am aware of the different types of dementia, so it's a bit unfair when people like Chris Sutton say it's a 'disgrace'.

"People who know me will say I'm a very sympathetic person - I know this is an emotional issue. To get tested for CTE you need an autopsy. That's a very tough decision for a family to take. But I'm not just being sympathetic about this, I'm doing something about it, too."

Money will not be an obstacle to the research project, Taylor insisted, but the PFA chief stressed the FA's support is essential.

"It's not going to falter because of a lack of funds," said Taylor.

"We are committed to playing our part but it's got to be in conjunction with the FA as they are the governing body."

News that the two organisations have finally agreed on the next step will be widely welcomed but it will not stop people asking why it has taken football, and the PFA in particular, so long to address such a fundamental 'duty of care' issue.

It is also often pointed out that the PFA is a relatively wealthy trade union and Taylor is one of the best-paid union officials in the world.

Taylor, however, rejects criticisms surrounding those points, and says the PFA's work in this area goes back "three decades", including starting a "forward-looking, longitudinal" research project in 2001.

He explained that the PFA was advised by experts that a long-term study would be the best approach and the Leeds-based research team tracked a group of young elite players for five years, checking their brain function for any signs of deterioration.

But the study simply took too long and its report, which did not find a causal link between playing football and brain injuries, was not published in a scientific journal until last year, by which time the FA, an early partner, had effectively disowned it.

Taylor said the new research is more likely to focus on ex-players, comparing their health to non-players of a similar age, and also looking for differences based on gender, lifestyle factors, what position they played and several other variables.

When asked if the PFA did anything during the 15-year wait for the Leeds research to emerge, Taylor gave a long defence of the union's attempts to get other football bodies interested in the area, including FIFA, the financial support it has provided to members afflicted by dementia, its counselling services and all the other health-related work it has done.

"We have a lot on our plate at the moment with the non-recent sexual abuse issue and ex-players being given bad tax advice but this is at the top of our agenda," he said.