Soccer
Almost eight months to the day after his dramatic collapse at the EM 2020, Christian Eriksen has opened a new chapter in his career. Shirt in hand, the 29-year-old Dane was introduced to Premier League club Brentford FC on Friday. “If I wasn’t 100 percent fit, then I wouldn’t be taking part in this adventure,” emphasized Eriksen during his presentation.
All tests of his heart were positive, said Eriksen. The 109-time Denmark international had returned to the Premier League on the last day of the transfer window. He had undergone extensive medical examinations at Brentford. He will play with a defibrillator that can send shocks in an emergency. Since then he has spoken to many doctors and taken part in development programs.
“It is unbelievable what is possible in modern medicine. It’s nice that everyone can go on living with an implanted defibrillator and can play high-performance sports,” Eriksen said in an interview broadcast by Sky. He suddenly collapsed on the lawn on June 12, 2021 during Denmark’s European Championship game against Finland and had to be revived. The football world was in shock.
“Don’t touch with kid gloves”
Most recently, he also spoke to ex-teammate Daley Blind from Ajax Amsterdam, who encouraged him to trust the implanted defibrillator and the technology behind it. Some time ago, Blind himself had one of these implants inserted. Eriksen does not want to be given preferential treatment at his club. “I told my teammates on the first day that there was no reason to treat me with kid gloves. Otherwise I wouldn’t need to be on the soccer field anymore.”
You can’t play with such an implant in the Italian Serie A. Eriksen’s contract with champions Inter Milan was therefore terminated. Most recently, he had prepared for his return to professional football in his Danish homeland and with the reserves of his ex-club Ajax.
Comeback in der Premier League
He played more than 300 games for Tottenham Hotspur from 2013 to 2020. Brentford had been on his list for a long time. “I already knew Brentford as a club in the 2nd division,” said Eriksen, who, among others, meets Danish coach Thomas Frank at the London club. Brentford are 14th in the table with 23 points. The last six – cross-competition – games were lost.
Frank stressed on Friday that Eriksen is training well, but he didn’t want to commit to a date for the Danish playmaker’s debut: “I think he’s fine, he’s training well and he looks like the quality player we know about that he is.”
