PETER Schmeichel has claimed Denmark players were warned they would forfeit their Euro 2020 opener against Finland if they did not play out the remainder of the game after Christian Eriksen collapsed on the pitch.

Peter, the father of Leicester City and Denmark goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel, was speaking on Monday morning’s instalment of Good Morning Britain.

The former Manchester United goalkeeper claims the players were given three options – play the remainder of the game on Saturday, play the final 50 minutes on Sunday or forfeit the match with a 3-0 defeat.

When asked about the decision to restart the game Schmeichel said:”Well that’s an interesting debate.

MORE NEWS:

“I actually saw an official quote from UEFA yesterday saying that they were following the advice of the player, the players insisted on playing… I know that not to be the truth.

“Or, it’s how you see the truth. They were left with three options, one was to play immediately and get the last 50 minutes played.

“The next one was to come in yesterday at 12 noon and finish the 50 minutes and the third option was to forfeit the game, 3-0.

“So, work it out for yourself. Is it the players' wish to play? Did they have any choice really? I don't think they had.

“As you can hear from yesterday's press conference, the coach, he seriously regrets putting the players back on to the pitch.”

On Sunday night, Denmark’s team doctor Morten Boesen has confirmed Christian Eriksen suffered a cardiac arrest and that “he was gone” prior to being resuscitated.

Eriksen collapsed on Saturday during the first half of Denmark’s opening Euro 2020 match against Finland before being treated on the pitch and taken to hospital.

After it was later confirmed the Inter Milan midfielder was stable, his team-mates agreed to resume the fixture in Copenhagen, with Finland claiming a 1-0 win thanks to Joel Pohjanpalo’s 59th-minute goal.

At a press conference arranged by the Danish Football Federation on Sunday afternoon, Boesen said: “He was gone. We did cardiac resuscitation, it was a cardiac arrest.

“How close were we to losing him? I don’t know, but we got him back after one defib, so that’s quite fast.”

“We don’t have any explanation why it happened. The details about what happened I am not quite sure of because I am not a cardiologist, I will leave that to the experts. I didn’t see it live, only on screens afterwards.”

The team doctor revealed that Denmark’s players and staff were visited by a psychologist on Saturday night, and in hindsight feels the game should not have resumed.

“I don’t think the right decision was to play the game,” Boesen said. “We have had help from a psychological point of view at the hotel last night.

“Everyone expressed their feelings and how they saw the situation, and everyone was pleased we did this and talked it through.

“We really appreciated the professional help we have had from the outside.”

Denmark manager Kasper Hjulmand agreed that the match should not have been completed after the incident, and that the squad will try to use what happened as motivation for their next game against Belgium on Thursday.

“No we should not have played,” said Hjulmand. “We will try tomorrow to establish normality as much as possible. Players have different reactions to shocks and trauma but we will try to get back to normal as much as possible.

“I get the feelings from the players that maybe the time is too short to try to play football again, but maybe we can use it as a force to get together and try to go out and do our best in the next match.

“We will see if we can get ourselves together and play for Christian.”