The 29-year-old collapsed to the ground at Parken Stadium in Copenhagen shortly before half-time, leaving players from both sides in distress. Doctors quickly rushed to the field and began administering CPR. His wife, Sabrina Kvist Jensen, was in the stadium at the time and was visibly upset by the incident. She was consoled by fellow Danish players Simon Kjaer and Kasper Schmeichel.
The BBC has been criticized for continuing to show footage of the medical treatment and for filming Eriksen’s upset wife.
But the company was quick to issue a public apology and said it was not responsible for the coverage at the stadium.
They said in a statement: “Everyone at the BBC is hoping that Christian Eriksen makes a full recovery.
“We apologize to anyone who was upset by the images shown.
“The coverage in the stadium is controlled by UEFA as the host broadcaster, and as soon as the game was suspended we took our coverage off the air as quickly as possible.”
Gary Linekar, who hosted the BBC studio’s commentary, also apologized for the live coverage of the distressing scene.
He wrote on Twitter: “We’ll be back at 7:25 am on @bbcone.
“I understand that some of you would have been upset by some of the images shown (us too). Obviously, these were images of the host and out of our control.
“They should have stayed on a large part of the stadium. All my excuses.”
Eriksen is now awake after being stabilized and transferred to hospital, with UEFA and the Danish Football Union confirming the news via Twitter.
Denmark tweeted an update which read: “Christian Eriksen is awake and (ready) for further exams at the Rigshospitalet (hospital).”
The first round match between the two nations was quickly suspended but was given the green light to resume at 7:30 p.m. at the request of both teams.
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