The Danish Football Association says Christian Eriksen is conscious and undergoing further tests in the hospital after collapsing on the field again while playing for the national team.
TV images showed the 34-year-old midfielder clutching his chest with both hands in an off-the-ball action in the 65th minute of Denmark’s international friendly against Ukraine in Odense.
In the next TV image shown, Eriksen is on the ground, surrounded by worried-looking players. Ukraine’s coaching staff are seen waving medical personnel onto the field.
The match was later abandoned.
The concerning scenes echoed Eriksen’s on-field collapse following a cardiac arrest during the European Championship in 2021.
Minutes later, the Danish federation posted on X, saying Eriksen was “conscious and, under the circumstances, doing well”.
In a fuller statement posted 10 minutes later, Denmark team physician Morten Boesen said: “Christian is doing well and left the field himself. As I see it, the pacemaker is beating as it should.”
After saying Eriksen was briefly unconscious, Boesen added in the statement that he “very quickly regained consciousness, and we were quickly in contact with him”.
“Now he needs to be examined further in the hospital to find out what caused the incident,” Boesen said.
“We are in constant contact with him and the doctors at the hospital. But Christian is doing well, and he asked me to greet all the players and say that he was OK.”
Danish and Ukrainian players accompanied Christian Eriksen to a waiting ambulance. (AP: Bo Amstrup/Ritzau Scanpix)
The match was officially called off by the referee in the 79th minute, with Denmark leading 2-1, after he spoke to both coaches and sets of players.
While Eriksen was being treated, there was initially a hush in the crowd before a chant of “Eriksen, Eriksen” went around the stadium.
After the match was abandoned, players from both teams formed a circle around the two coaches in one half of the field. The coaches were seen talking to the players.
The teams then walked around the field to applause from the crowd, with some players visibly upset.
Christian Eriksen is regarded as one of the greats of Danish football. (AP: Omar Havana)
Eriksen’s collapse during Denmark’s opening European Championship group game in 2021, against Finland in Copenhagen, sent the football world into shock.
Eriksen, one of Denmark’s greatest players, was given lengthy medical treatment before regaining consciousness and said he was later informed he was “gone from this world for five minutes”.
He resumed his professional playing career 259 days later after being fitted with an implantable cardioverter defibrillator.
Eriksen played for Brentford and Manchester United before joining German club Wolfsburg in 2025. He has a contract with Wolfsburg until the end of the 2026–27 season.
Neither Denmark nor Ukraine qualified for the World Cup.
AP
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