"As soon as I went to go with it, it flipped my feet and legs over and my head just spearheaded into the sand. I knew I was in trouble. I wasn't in deep water but it was above my waist. I was sort of bent over and just had to try and get out as quick as I could."
"I think shock takes over. I knew something wasn't right because I heard a crack as I went over and I couldn't lift myself up. If I had been knocked unconscious, I can't imagine what would have happened, because I could have gone under the water. People were trying to make me comfortable and my wife knew not to move my neck as I waited for the ambulance."
The 54-year-old replaced Michael O'Neill as Northern Ireland manager in 2020 and was sacked in 2022 when O'Neill returned. He married his long-term partner Alexia three months ago and was hospitalised two days after the wedding during a beach incident. A wave flipped his legs and drove his head into the sand, producing a crack and immediate inability to move his lower body. After a 45-minute wait for an ambulance, MRI and CT scans showed a fractured vertebra impinging the spinal cord, causing loss of movement and severe panic while his wife stabilised his neck.
Read at Irish Independent
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