Journalist Mark Douglas has been blown away by the emotional interview Tottenham Hotspur midfielder Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg has given.
Earlier this week, the Spurs man spoke on BBC’s Football Focus about his journey into the world of professional football and how it was made so much more difficult by the cancer diagnosis and eventual death of his father.
Hojbjerg joined German giants Bayern Munich as a teenager in 2012 and spent a year there before his dad became ill. His father moved with him from Denmark despite having to undergo chemotherapy.
Opening up about this complex time in his development as an athlete and a person, the Tottenham midfielder said (via BBC Sport): “I remember getting injured in the beginning of August [2013].
“I thought ‘my life is finished, I can’t play for a couple of weeks, everything is really bad’.
“A couple of days later, my father calls me and it was really difficult for him to speak. He was very quiet and not saying any words, but staying on the phone, and I asked what’s wrong and he said it wasn’t good and he had cancer.
“I remember being very sad, really sad. I was frustrated, also angry because I was so far away from home and it puts everything into perspective.”
Reacting to this interview from Hojbjerg, Douglas took to Twitter to praise the player’s honesty, writing: “What a fascinating answer. He has no idea how much his honesty will likely help a lot of people going through similar things. Great interview.”
TIF Thoughts on Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg and Spurs…
It must have been an awfully difficult time to find the motivation for football when such a seismic life event was happening. Nevertheless, Hojbjerg managed to break into the Munich team while also helping his father.
Indeed, in the same interview, he explained: “My father would always take care of me, then suddenly I had to take care of him. I was cooking for him, I was putting him in bed, making sure that he got his medication and all of these things. These things scar you a bit.
“It didn’t go as we hoped, he passed away in April [2014]. I finished the season, I played the cup final, I got my national team debut. From a sports perspective, the season really finished on a high, but from a life perspective, it really finished on a low.
“I had difficulty to motivate myself. It’s the first time actually that I have spoken about it like this.”
After winning a number of trophies with Bayern, the midfielder moved to England and impressed at Southampton before moving on to Tottenham in the summer of 2020 (via Transfermarkt).
Since then, he has developed into one of the club’s most important players and has certainly earned the trust of current boss Antonio Conte, having started every Premier League and Champions League game so far this season.
No doubt, Hojbjerg’s willingness to open up emotionally about such a difficult chapter in his life will help others going through similar struggles.