Eriksen to resume rehabilitation in Denmark after ICD fires during collapse on international duty

Christian Eriksen will continue his recovery in Denmark after his implantable cardioverter defibrillator fired during a collapse while playing for Denmark against Ukraine in an international friendly last month, his Bundesliga 2 club Wolfsburg have confirmed. The 34-year-old is not expected to retire, despite growing concern from medical experts over the risks he faces.

In an official statement explaining Eriksen’s absence from their pre-season camp, Wolfsburg said: “Christian Eriksen will soon begin an individual rehabilitation programme. After a conversation with VfL managing director Dieter Hecking, it was decided that the 34-year-old will complete this in his home country of Denmark. VfL is in regular contact with Christian as well as the treating physicians. For the course of his rehabilitation, we continue to wish Christian all the best.”

Eriksen had an ICD installed following his cardiac arrest at Euro 2021. The device detects dangerous heart rhythms and delivers a shock to restore a normal beat — a function it performed when he collapsed clutching his chest during the Ukraine friendly.

The decision to push on with his career comes despite stark warnings from Danish heart specialist Henning Molgaard, who has publicly called for Eriksen to retire. “We know he will collapse again at some point,” Molgaard told Danish outlet Bold. “But we simply cannot say with certainty whether the ICD device will be needed to restart his heart in three months, or in three, four, five, or ten years. However, it is going to happen again.”

Eriksen, who joined Wolfsburg after spells at Manchester United and Tottenham, made 34 appearances in the 2025-26 season, contributing three goals and ten assists and captaining the side in the latter stages of the campaign. He showed no signs of cardiac trouble before the collapse on international duty. Wolfsburg were relegated to the German second division during that campaign, and Eriksen remains under contract with the club for another 12 months.

The Wolfsburg statement is the first official update on Eriksen’s condition since he released a personal message the day after the incident. In it, he wrote: “As you can probably imagine, receiving a shock from my ICD has had a major impact on both me and my family, but I want to reassure everyone that this was a different situation from what happened in 2021.”

Wolfsburg open their second-division campaign on 8 August 2026 against Kaiserslautern, a fixture Eriksen is highly unlikely to be available for.