MRI age verification of U-17 footballers: The Ghana study

Background: A fair playground is absolutely necessary in any age limited sports. Age determination in countries where birth registration is not compulsory can often be difficult making it a challenge to determine ages of people born in such countries. Objective: To determine correlation between chronological ages of under 17 Ghanaian footballers and the FIFA MRI grading. Method: The degree of radial epiphyseal fusion was evaluated in 286 male Ghanaian footballers aged 13–16 years over a 4 year period (June 2012–November 2016) using 1.5 T Magnetic Resonance Imaging. The ages of the participants used in the study were those provided by the football players and confirmed with their national passports. Results: Over 48% of these Ghanaian players below the age of 17 years had completely fused radial epiphysis. No significant correlation between the given chronological ages and the degree of fusion was found. The Spearmans correlation was given as (r = 0.069; p = 0.540). Conclusion: There was no correlation between chronological age and degree of radial fusion among Ghanaian players. Normative study among Ghanaian/black African players is long overdue to ensure the U-17 players from these countries are not unfairly disadvantaged.