ALMOST 14 years after he suffered a heart attack during a club game which ended his playing career at the age of 27, former Ireland international Clive Clarke says he still lives with the episode on a daily basis.

And the Wicklow native, now working as a player agent in the UK, feels that Denmark’s Christian Eriksen should prepare for the fact that his footballing career is at an end but also celebrate the fact that his life was saved.

Clarke had a cardiac arrest at half-time in a League Cup game in August 2007, when he was playing for Leicester City, as his heart stopped for four minutes and he was only revived by a fourth attempt with a defibrillator.

“People asked me if the Eriksen incident brought up a load of memories for me but I have lived with my incident every day for the last 14 years of my life, and I live on a daily basis with what went on that day so there were no huge flashbacks, it’s a daily thing,” Clarke told the Irish Independent.

“When I saw it on Saturday night I thought it looked very similar to what I had. I felt really sorry and upset for Eriksen, thankfully he pulled through, straight away you could see it was a cardiac arrest when he’d collapsed. My only thought now would be hoping he pulls through.

“Playing football will be the last thing on his mind now, he just needs to make a full recovery. I’m not a doctor, but if he has had the same thing as I had, I’d imagine the pathway back to professional football will be very difficult. If his career does come to an end, he will realise he was lucky to play the game at the level he did and he has a whole life ahead of him, he has to try and take the positives out of this situation.”

Full interview in Tuesday's Irish Independent and on Independent.ie.