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Motherwell captain collapsed, and later died, during the match with Dundee United today. Aged 35.

Just heard the news on Radio 5 Live.
My Deepest Sympathy to his family and friends

Never heard of this player, but its a massive blow for Motherwell.
RIP

Absolutely tragic, he never really fulfilled his potential that he had in his young days at Motherwell and then at Celtic because of bad injuries. He came down to Sheffield Wednesday but never got going due to niggling injuries. RIP

Very tragic news indeed to a player that was seen as a legend at Fir Park.A similar incident took the life of an aspiring Seville player back in August.

Incidents like these certainly puts things into perspective and rubbishes Bill Shankly's old quote that "Football is more than a matter of life and deaf"

Club doctors should be more hands on with players health but the sad fact is that not many clubs can afford high-tec equipment that can detect ill-effects in a footballer/sportsperson's health.

RIP Phil O'Donnell and condolences to his family and friends.

So far, they are only saying a "seizure," so it could have been anything: heart failure, embolism. Motherwell lost Davie Cooper, one of the finest wingers we've ever produced, to a brain haemorrhage in the 1990s (not during a game).

A few footballers have collapsed on the pitch.Marc Vivein Foe for Cameroon and most recentley Antonio La Puerta for Seville,and he was barely 21 years old.

I don't know about the SFA but the English FA has made it mandatory for footballers to have regular health checks,especially younger players.But it's the responsibility of the club doctor(not that any blame should be laid at Motherwell's doctor)to carry out regular health checks.

Footballers also have to submit Family history regarding health as most heart defects are known to be hereditary.

It's sensible, without a doubt. And yet, in spite of all those checks, someone can still just collapse and die. Some people are born with little faults in their brain or heart, like some unseen ticking time bomb. Even if medical science could detect the fault, it's nigh on impossible to do anything about it.

The post mortem will tell us what happened, but the reality is that a family is missing a father, husband, son. As your mention of Foe and La Puerta demonstrates, these things happen---but are mercifully rare.

Caractacus wrote:

> It's sensible, without a doubt. And yet, in spite of all those
> checks, someone can still just collapse and die. Some people
> are born with little faults in their brain or heart, like some
> unseen ticking time bomb. Even if medical science could detect
> the fault, it's nigh on impossible to do anything about it.
>
> The post mortem will tell us what happened, but the reality is
> that a family is missing a father, husband, son. As your
> mention of Foe and La Puerta demonstrates, these things
> happen---but are mercifully rare.Very true.A terrible,tragic time for O'Donnell's family.

Indeed Mr Carac. We could all be carrying these little 'ticking bombs' without even knowing it. If there's anything that could be seen as a slight positive from this, it is that the lad died doing a job he probably dreamt about as a boy. He lived his dream, which is more than what 99% of us never get to do.

He could have triggered the incident in a 12 hour shift, in a factory job that he hated, but had to do to feed his children. That's a more common way of dying, unfortunately.