Barnsley's players are determined to win at Fleetwood Town for the club volunteer who suffered a heart attack on Saturday.
Stephen Croft, who organises the child flag-bearers who stand next to the tunnel as the players walk out onto the pitch, collapsed a minute before the game against Burton Albion was due to kick-off at Oakwell on Saturday. The match was called off and he was airlifted to hospital. The 61-year-old – who works for Barnsley Council as a road safety officer – remains in hospital but is awake and making a steady recovery.
Assistant coach Andreas Winkler told the Chronicle: “I think the players have an extra motivation to win for him in this next game. The players, the fans and the medical teams all handled it very well and I was delighted with that.”
Striker Kieffer Moore added: “There are bigger things than football and when something like that happens it’s never nice to see. Thankfully he is recovering well and hopefully he’ll be back at Oakwell before we know it. There is an extra incentive and we’d love to get three points in honour of Stephen.”
Croft was treated yards from the pitch in front of the away end by medical staff from both clubs – who had been called over by Burton players – and staff from the Yorkshire Ambulance Service who had attended the game to show fans how to perform resuscitation techniques.
An air ambulance helicopter landed on the pitch just after 3.30pm then, after the match was called off a few minutes later, Stephen was airlifted to Northern General Hospital in Sheffield at 4pm. His family announced in a statement on the club’s website later that night that he was in a stable condition after being put in an induced coma at Oakwell.
Winkler added: “It’s the best news of the week that Steve is still with us. We heard he is talking and now we can look forward to seeing him back at Oakwell in a couple of weeks. We are lucky our players weren’t too close, but the Burton players were very close and it was a really difficult situation.
“When we heard that they got him back, everybody was clapping hands in the dressing room. This was the only thing we wanted to hear.“If you work for free for the club, it means a lot to our club. We don’t only exist because of the players or employees but because of the people who spend their free time at Oakwell.”
Stephen’s family have been updating fans all week. Their statement on Saturday evening read: “We would like to sincerely thank the Burton players and both clubs’ officials for their rapid response to Stephen’s collapse.Without their rapid response, he would not be here now.
“The family would like to thank both sets of fans for their dignity and understanding. This sort of incident brings out the best in people and that could be seen in the stands and on the pitch at Oakwell. They are a credit to both teams. The family are humbled by the messages of support received.
“It goes without saying we can all be proud of our ambulance services including the air ambulance, who we all couldn’t thank enough.”
On Wednesday, they added: “Stephen is now awake in hospital and able to talk to us. He is still poorly and there is clearly a long road to recovery ahead, but all the signs are positive. The improvement in his condition since Saturday evening has been remarkable and we would like to extend our thanks to the wonderful staff at the Northern General.”
No date has been set for the rearranged match against Burton.
