Denmark’s former Manchester United and Tottenham midfielder Christian Eriksen collapsed on the pitch in a match against Ukraine on Sunday, but was conscious as he was taken from the field by medics.
The incident happened during what was an end-of-season friendly between two sides who have not qualified for the World Cup. Eriksen, who suffered a cardiac arrest during a European Championship match in 2021, was quickly tended to by medics in Odense, while the referee abandoned the match early.
Denmark’s football federation subsequently issued a statement saying Eriksen was conscious and “doing well under the circumstances”, while the national team’s doctor, Morten Boesen, said the player was “briefly unconscious, but regained consciousness very quickly … and walked off the pitch by himself”.
After the incident against Finland in 2021, during which Boesen led the successful resuscitation effort, Eriksen was fitted with an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD) in his chest, which can reset the heart after a cardiac arrest. The device allowed him to resume his playing career at club and international level.
He subsequently told the BBC of the Finland game: “I can remember everything apart from the five minutes. I was told afterwards it was five minutes, otherwise I remember everything – the throw-in, the ball hitting my knee and then I don’t know what happened after.
“Then I woke up with people around me and felt the pressure on my chest, trying to get my breathing back, and then I woke up – I opened my eyes and saw people around me, I didn’t really understand what was going on.
“At that time I had no idea what had happened, then it goes through my head: ‘Did something happen with my legs? Did I break my back? Can I lift my leg up?’ – all small things I was trying to do to see what happened.
“Then in the ambulance I heard someone say: ‘How long was he out for?’ and someone said: ‘Five minutes,’ and that was the first time I had heard I was gone.”
