Alvaro Pereira Takes Knee to Head; Remains in Match for Uruguay

A scary moment happened in the second half of Uruguay’s match with England on Thursday in Sao Paulo. Uruguay’s Alvaro Pereira took a knee to the side of the head from England’s Raheem Sterling. He looked to have been knocked out (briefly), but after cursory treatment on the sideline he went back in the game about a minute later.

Soccer around the world is woefully behind many North American sports in how it deals with potential head injuries. During the most-recent Premier League season Tottenham keeper Hugo Lloris took a knee to the head from Romelu Lukaku but remained in the game due to the decision of then-Spurs boss Andre Villas-Boas. Ironically Lukuku needed to leave that game to ice his knee due to the impact.

Hey @SeppBlatter let me know when you want to address head injuries in our game. Perreira should've been taken off. Has to stop. #URUvsENG
— Taylor Twellman (@TaylorTwellman) June 19, 2014