Leam Richardson and Charlie Wyke relive day the Rotherham United striker nearly died to launch SkyBet and British Heart Foundation's 'Every Minute Matters'

“We were just doing a bit of a light session and the ball came to me. Normally my touch is perfect,” laughs Wyke, “so when it bounced off me I knew something was wrong.

“I couldn’t see the ball coming to me. I went over to talk to the manager and that’s the last thing I remember. I just said “gaffer” and collapsed.”

Wyke’s heart stopped beating for five minutes. He is only here telling the story some two and a half years later because his gaffer was Leam Richardson who just a few weeks earlier had done a CPR refresher course and was able to keep his striker, his player, his friend, alive.

“For me it was like an outer-body experience,” says Richardson. “Thankfully a few weeks before we’d done a lot of CPR training with the staff and the club doctor Jonathan Tobin who had worked on Fabrice Muamba when he collapsed on the pitch.

“It’s one thing learning how to do CPR and First Aid, but the thing that does get missed is the signs to look for, what is cardiac arrest?

“Jonathan had been involved with a few and had educated us on that, and if I hadn’t have seen that myself and understood exactly what it was, I’m not sure what actions I’d have taken. But given the education and the thorough nature of how we went through it, it gives you the confidence to then try and put that into practice. Then everything else is a little bit surreal, something takes over and you do what is necessary at the time.”

Richardson is keen to stress Wyke’s life was saved not just by his quick-thinking, but by everyone who played a part that day; the team-mate who rang the ambulance, the club doctor who rushed out, the people who cleared the road to get the ambulance in.

For Middlesbrough-born Wyke, a 28-year-old Wigan striker at the time, it is assistance he will be eternally grateful for.

“That day for me was a complete blur,” he recalls.

“My heart stopped for five minutes, it seemed like five seconds to me.”

Football can be a cynical business and the world quickly moved on.

Almost a year later Leeds-born Richardson was sacked by Wigan after they lost six games in a row. He tried rebuilding his career at Rotherham United this season but inherited a club heading down and lost his job just two weeks ago. In February, he offered Wyke the chance to revive his career with a loan spell at Rotherham, but neither could save the Millers from the drop.

Words like ‘revive’ and ‘save’ to describe the fate of a football club seem trivial in these circumstances.

Richardson and Wyke were reunited again at Wembley Stadium this week to help launch a collaboration between SkyBet and the British Heart Foundation called ‘Every Minute Matters’ aimed at recruiting 270,000 people to learn lifesaving CPR over the next 12 months.

Wyke took his place in the ‘Re-Starting 11’ alongside Muamba, David Ginola, Tom Lockyer, Glenn Hoddle and other people in football who have suffered cardiac arrests.

SkyBet is pledging up to £3m to support the BHF during the next 12 months, starting with £10,000 donated for every goal scored during this month’s Sky Bet Play-Offs.

There are more than 30,000 out-of-hospital cardiac arrests in the UK each year, equating to at least five every 90 minutes.

“Everybody should at least have the education,” says Richardson. “Because a lot of people will think it’ll never happen to me, but it will. That’s the biggest mental challenge you have to get over.

“There’s always a first and it’s always quite daunting, but if you’ve got that education and foresight to look for the signs then this initiative to touch 270,000 people is worth it. If this scheme saves one life then it’s worth it.

“On occasions like today you hear lots of positive stories, whereas I’m sure there are many that aren’t positive, so if we can give that understanding and spread that message on not only how to deliver the CPR and the First Aid, but what signs to look for, then the more the merrier.”

For Wyke, who is looking for a new club and at 31 still capable of scoring goals as he showed with five in a month at the start of the season, if he has one lesson for footballers, or for other people to take from this, it is to pay more attention.

“I kept going dizzy, but you never think it’s going to be cardiac arrest, I never thought something this serious would happen to me,” he said.

“I just wish I’d done more. If you don’t feel right speak to someone as soon as you can, either your club doctor or get any medical assistance you can.

“And learn CPR. Download the British Heart Foundation app, go on the ReviveR training course. It’s only a 15-minute video. You never know, you could save a life one day.”

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