More than 500 former rugby union and league players will be able to press ahead with their lawsuits over neurological injuries after London’s high court ruled on Friday, according to the Guardian. The decision came despite their former lawyers’ failure to disclose key medical evidence to the sport’s governing bodies.

The governing bodies involved “World Rugby, the Rugby Football Union and the Welsh Rugby Union, plus the Rugby Football League and the British Amateur Rugby League Association” had asked the court for a ruling that would end the cases. They argued that the claimants’ lawyers had repeatedly failed to provide records, the Guardian reported.

Over 500 claimants had breached a court order by failing to disclose necessary neurological testing information to the defendants. The judge, however, said the claimants themselves were “blameless” for the missing documents.

The players’ representative, Susan Rodway KC, had said at the most recent hearing that the claimants were “staring into the precipice”. The Guardian described the legal action as having been brought back from the brink of collapse after the ruling gave a reprieve to hundreds of claimants who had been struck out from the case.

Senior Master Cook decided, with “some hesitation”, to allow all the affected claims to continue, the Guardian reported. The BBC described the litigation as rugby’s multi-million-pound concussion legal battle, involving the cases of hundreds of players.

The ruling means the wider legal action over brain injuries in rugby can proceed, keeping alive claims that had faced being dismissed over the procedural failures of the players’ former legal representatives.