Former Bristol Rovers defender Tom Lockyer has revealed he’s been given the all-clear after suffering an irregular heartbeat during the Championship play-off final for Luton Town which caused him to collapse and be taken to hospital.
Lockyer was stretchered off at Wembley after falling to the ground inside his own half with nobody around him and after several minutes of medical treatment was taken to hospital with Luton going on to beat Coventry City 6-5 on penalties.
The 28-year-old, who made 285 appearances for the Gas between 2012 and 2019 after starting his career in north Bristol, was diagnosed with a atrial flutter - an abnormal heart rhythm which causes the upper chambers of the heart to beat too quickly - and in an interview with Sky Sports has described the moments leading up to, during and after the incident.
“I'm doing well. It's been a mad week or so. I had the all-clear yesterday [Monday] and I'm all good moving forward,” Lockyer said. "I was quite lucky. They knew straight away what it was and it wasn't life-threatening. It was an atrial flutter, which is an irregular heartbeat, so my heart wasn't responding as it should in those situations.
"It's probably the least severe heart condition you could have and I had a little procedure on Wednesday [May 31] to correct that and it should never happen again.
"It's quite funny, really - I didn't feel anything at all. I had a great chance with the header and got a little bit excited from that, thinking I'd scored at Wembley!
"Then I was just running backwards, went really light-headed and my legs went really weak straightaway. I remember stumbling backwards.
"I was told I was coming off as I'd collapsed and I was like 'no, no I'm fine!' I wondered why I was on the floor, so that's when I realised and the emotions all went. When I went off on the stretcher, Rob (Edwards, Luton manager) came to me and said 'don't worry, we'll win it for you' and I was bawling my eyes out so couldn't respond."
An announcement was made during the game that Lockyer was conscious but it wasn’t until after full-time, where his dad Steve posted a video of the family celebrating the Hatters’ triumph from his hospital bed that concerns were fully allayed.
Although Lockyer has still had to undergo lengthy tests and assessment over five days in hospital to ensure he can continue his career as Luton prepare to compete in the Premier League, their first appearance in the top flight for 31 years.
Luton's player of the season and captain is out of contract this summer but it was confirmed last week he's in talks to extend his stay at Kenilworth Road.
"It was a long five days in hospital and it would have felt like even longer if we didn't win, of course," Lockyer added. "When you've got that time in the hospital bed on your own, you're thinking 'Will I be able to play again? Will I be able to be the same player? I'm out of contract in the summer, will I be able to get a new contract?' All these sorts of things run through your head.
"Initially, once they said it was going to be OK, there was some doubt, but I've had some follow-up tests and I've had the all-clear now, so I move onto a monitoring phase and they are going to watch me a little bit closer than they would normally.
"I can't thank Sanjay Sharma - the head cardiologist at the FA - enough. He looked after my case and was amazing throughout and has reassured me that my dream is still alive to carry on playing football because once I realised it wasn't life threatening, that's what it turned to: will I play football again?
"That's all that mattered to me and you can see from my smile that I'm delighted."
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