Amid the scenes of distraught Irish players, uncomfortable Welsh players, hard-working medics and sombre faces in the Aviva Stadium crowd, one man acted quickly and selflessly.
With Jon Walters signalling to the Irish bench that Seamus Coleman needed immediate help – after a horrendous Neil Taylor challenge – Shane Long bent down to comfort his friend, teammate and captain.
RTE refused to replay the incident until after the game so viewers were left with images of Long kneeling beside Coleman and offering him both security and consolation.
— Nooruddean (@BeardedGenius) March 24, 2017
Long told reporters after the game that he was trying to simply ‘settle and relax’ Coleman while the medics did their work and a stretcher was being prepared to remove him from the field of play.
Long’s wife, Kayleah, has told the Sunday Independent that her husband was using a breathing technique he had learned when the couple were preparing for the birth of their first daughter, Teigan. She commented:
“Shane told me he had thought of the time I gave birth to Teigan. I had a hypnotherapy birth and they taught Shane to help me to breathe through it.
“He told me, ‘It all came back to me. I was just talking to Seamus, teaching him how to breathe through it all’.”
Long said Coleman had been listening to him closely and had followed his breathing advice as medics set his leg in a splint. It is a measure of the man Coleman is that he thought of his friend’s concern and support as he was lying in a bed at St Vincent’s Hospital ahead of Saturday morning surgery.
Kayleah Long revealed that Coleman had sent a message to her husband that night ‘to thank him for his kindness’
Coleman had pins and screws inserted into his right leg on Saturday morning and, according to Ireland boss Martin O’Neill, doctors were pleased with how surgery went. He was visited by some of the Irish squad over the weekend, one of whom was Long.
With any luck, both players will be reunited in the green of Ireland later this year.
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