There is one final question for Rob Edwards, who was spoken so eloquently and sympathetically about Tom Lockyer's on-pitch cardiac arrest: what will be his final message to the Luton Town players on Saturday before they leave the dressing room to play it up? take on Newcastle United at an emotionally charged Kenilworth Road?
"We want to be brave and be able to embody what Locks is," says Edwards. "He is brave. He is determined - and we want to do it for him. That will be the message."
They are words that the Luton manager may have feared he would never be able to deliver on last Saturday when his captain collapsed in the second half of the Premier League match against Bournemouth.
Remarkably, it took just two minutes from the time the defender fell to the ground to the time he was resuscitated. Just two minutes. And the pace, led by Bournemouth midfielder Philip Billing closest to Lockyer, has been crucial to his recovery so far as he eventually left the pitch and was taken to the medical room at Bournemouth's Vitality Stadium.
As doctors, led by Luton's Amos Ogunkoya, worked on Lockyer, teammates and opponents stood outside desperately waiting for news. Among them were three fellow Wales internationals in Bournemouth, led by his close friend David Brooks, who later visited him in hospital.
"They made every decision under the scrutiny of the watching world," Edwards said of the medical staff. "An incredible, incredible job. They are heroes. They saved him."
Still, those first two minutes must have felt like an eternity for Edwards, who had run onto the field.
Last May, during the Championship play-off final at Wembley, Lockyer was shocked when he went down and was taken away before being diagnosed with atrial fibrillation, which meant the top part of his heart was beating four times faster than it should. have been. This was corrected after the operation. Edwards knew this incident was different. This time it was more serious. It was cardiac arrest, and from the sidelines, "I just felt it," Edwards said. 'I can not explain. I just felt it. But now we also know that it is different. He had also fallen before in May and you automatically start to worry. Yes, I just felt it and you soon saw that it was different. You could see it there. I don't want to go into details because that would reveal too much."
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While medics were working on Lockyer on the field, his partner, Taylor, who is seven months pregnant, came to the sidelines. "It was tough for all of us, but for those closest to him, I can't imagine how they felt," Edwards said. "Steve, his father, was incredible in the way he handled it. Incredible people. It must have been so scary for them."
After the match was abandoned and after Edwards finally left the stadium, the manager went to see Lockyer, who had been taken to the local hospital. "I didn't know what to expect," Edwards admits. "He was plugged into everything and was chatting, smiling and quite jovial. Incredible. He's an incredible man. It was nice to just give him a hug and a kiss and have a chat with him."
And did Lockyer say anything? "Believe it or not, he was his usual self, joking and talking about doing anything to get out of the Christmas spirit," Edwards said. Luton's Christmas party was scheduled that evening before the players took two days off.
Edwards decided to continue with the days off. It meant the players were back with their families and loved ones and given some time to process what had happened before returning to the Luton training ground on Tuesday morning.
Edwards called a meeting. Unsure of what was going on with Lockyer made it difficult to pitch, but Luton turned to the charity Sporting Chance, which provides advice and mental health support.
"It was hard," Edwards said. "I was honest [with the players] and letting them know what stage he was at, knowing he was in very, very good hands. So on Tuesday I was still a bit emotional. It was still quite emotional for me."
Edwards decided to let his coaches, Ritchie Kyle and Paul Trollope, have a relaxed training session while he observed and made himself available for any conversations, especially as he knew many of the players, led by Lockyer's best friend at the club Carlton Morris. had contact.
"As far as I know the players are fine, their mental state is good and there are no concerns," Edwards told Sporting Chance, explaining the role they could play in the future. "They checked in and the players were able to use that if they felt they needed to," Edwards said. "It's important that they also spoke to the group and said, 'This is what we are, this is what we can do, if you need anything, we're here.'"
Luton staff have been on the lookout for signs of 'triggering' moments for players.
Edwards, only 40 years old and "never had to deal with anything like this before," was flooded with messages of support. Steve Cooper, who knew Edwards from his time as a coach in the Football Association, has been in touch every day even as he dealt with his sacking from Nottingham Forest. "With everything he's been through this past week," Edwards said. "That just shows the class of the man."
There will also, he says, be a 'special bond' with Bournemouth and their head coach, Andoni Iraola, who he has been in contact with and who himself acted so quickly.
Wednesday was another scheduled day off and Edwards felt it was good to continue with that before the players resume training on Thursday. He was also able to give them a positive update on Lockyer, which lifted the mood, with Morris going to visit his teammate at his home after being discharged from hospital. Other players will follow.
Lockyer was seen by Professor Sanjay Sharma, chairman of the Football Association's Expert Cardiac Committee, who arranged his recovery after the incident last May. An implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) is placed in the player's chest, which detects and stops irregular heartbeats.
Former Manchester United defender Daley Blind and their current midfielder Christian Eriksen have both been fitted with the device in recent years and have been able to continue playing. But it's far too early to say what will happen to Lockyer as his collapse happened just a week ago. "All I care about is his health," Edwards said. "Nothing else came to my mind."
From his son's home, Lockyer's father texted Edwards. "He feels like he has fought a bear," it said. Edwards relayed this to the players. "He's a very important man, so we talked about that and what he means to us," he says. "We want to embody that as a team and if we can all act, behave and play like Tom Lockyer then we are on the right track. It was a scary moment, but the most important thing is that he is doing well and we have work to do and we want to do it for Tom.
Tapping into that emotion will be a fine balance, as Edwards admits, with Luton returning their focus to fighting to stay in the Premier League after Lockyer's fight to save his life. "We all care about him and love him," Edwards said. "He wants us to do it and we want to do it for him. It will be an emotional day for everyone involved. We want to make him proud."
