Premier League footballers Wayne Rooney could be smarter than most university students because of the way their brains work, a study has claimed.
Scientists say Premier League players have the ability to ‘hyper-focus’ giving them much greater awareness of their surroundings. Experts at a Canadian university analysed the cortex part of the brain in a number of trained athletes, finding it was thicker than that of average men and women.
They also asked professional and amateur sports people – including 102 professional players from the English Premier League – and non-sporty university students to carry out a series of observation tests.
Professor Jocelyn Faubert, of the University of Montreal's School of Optometry, said athletes were better at interpreting moving pictures giving them greater awareness when driving, walking, or playing sport.
He said: "Study participants were asked to describe a series of simulated objects moving through three dimensions.
“Although the context had nothing to do with any specific sport, we found that professional athletes were able to process the visual scenes much better than amateur athletes who were in turn better than the students. It would appear that athletes are able to hyper-focus their attention to enhance learning, which is key to their abilities.”
Professor Faubert has previously worked with Manchester United after creating a computer simulation machine, which tested player's visual abilities.