Best “Optimistic” About Getting Back On The Pitch

Ireland prop Simon Best’s visit to a cardiac specialist in Dublin yesterday has given him an optimistic outlook as he sets out on a rehabilitation programme that will hopefully see him back on the pitch soon.

A sudden health scare for Best saw him hospitalised in Bordeaux last Wednesday as Ireland prepared for their final World Cup pool match against Argentina.

Best’s symptoms of a loss of feeling down his right side, a headache and speech difficulties led to a diagnosis of an irregular heartbeat, following tests carried out at the Pellegrin and Haut Leveque Hospitals.

Now back in Ireland and thankfully recovered, the Ulster front rower visited a cardiac specialist yesterday to determine what course of action he can take to get back playing for his province and country.

Best said: “The cardiac specialist has put me on a couple of different drugs and wants to see how I react over the next few weeks. He was fairly optimistic and said a number of things can cause it.

“He is looking to see if it is going to happen again and over the next three to six weeks he will be looking into that. I am due to get tested a couple of times every week and see how it pans out. But he was fairly optimistic.”

The player himself is also remaining positive, given the medical expertise available to him, and is hopeful of getting back on the pitch “fairly soon.”

“I don’t know if I will play again for sure yet but I am optimistic, I’m feeling pretty good at the moment. I have felt stable since Saturday when the heart rhythm returned,” he told the Belfast Telegraph.

“Even before that, despite being aware of a slightly irregular rhythm, I wasn’t in any way feeling bad at all, I was really only aware of it from time to time.

“This is something that is going to take a bit of time to get to the bottom of and the next three weeks will hopefully tell a bit of a story. Hopefully it will be good news over the next few weeks.

“I am absolutely confident that the doctors here will give me the best advice and the best treatment possible. I’m very confident in their arms right from Gary O’Driscoll with Ireland to David Irwin with Ulster and now David Keane, who will be looking over the whole thing as the cardiologist in Dublin,” the 29-year-old added.