Graeme Souness admits he would cry 'for no reason' and felt 'like a little boy' after having open heart surgery... as he and David Ginola share emotional stories about their health scares

Graeme Souness has opened up to David Ginola on his life-changing open heart surgery and how it made him 'feel like a little boy' after a career being taught to be 'aggressive' as a footballer. 

Souness is a Liverpool legend having made 354 appearances for the club as a player, winning 15 trophies - and also taking charge of the Reds as a manger between 1991 and 1994. 

But since finishing his playing career Souness has been battling heart issues after being diagnosed with heart disease in 1991 and forced to undergo surgery. 

The 71-year-old - who suffered a heart attack in 2015 - has been attempting to raise awareness of heart-related issues and spoke out about how the operation made him more emotional and changed his life, in vast contrast to how footballers are raised to be.

After Ginola - who suffered a cardiac arrest aged 49 in 2016 after collapsing during a charity game - asked Souness how his life had changed following the surgery. The pair recently teamed up with the British Heart Foundation to promote a campaign to recruit 270,000 people to learn CPR.

'It did for a while,' Souness said. 'You're cleaning your teeth and your focus goes down to your chest. And it's a little reminder that I was 38 at the time. When you're young you feel you're invincible. I certainly did. It's me. I can deal with anything. [There was] a vulnerability that I didn't think I was capable of.

Ginola then asked him if the ordeal changed his personality, with Souness revealing that he had become more emotional and began to cry during certain moments. 

'I think it did,' he said. 'I don't mind admitting that there was two or three occasions post-operation where for no reason I'm watching television, I'm driving my car where I just started to cry. I had tears coming down my face. Psychologically it was difficult.'

Ginola said he had experienced similar emotions, adding: 'This is strange because I became more sensitive, sensitive about things. And if I see something that in a normal life that would not make me do anything, I start to cry. I said, "why are you crying?" And it seems that your body and your brain is reacting much more about.'

The former France, Tottenham and Newcastle star then discussed how he was urged to seek help mentally by his doctor, who insisted the former footballer thought he was 'invincible' but would soon think 'why me?', 'why am I still there?'

Souness explained that footballers have been hard-wired to have a 'never say die attitude' and be aggressive', but said having the heart surgery made him feel much more vulnerable. 

'We come from - it's a hard school football,' he said. 'We're taught to be aggressive and [have a] never say die attitude. And when this happens, it makes you feel like a little boy again. That's how I felt.'

Football has seen a number of worrying incidents around heart health after Christian Eriksen's cardiac arrest at Euro 2020 during a game for Denmark. 

And in December, Luton Town defender Tom Lockyer collapsed during a game against Bournemouth, seven months after a similar incident during last year's Championship play-off final. 

Ginola later opened up about his own episode as he explained being lost for words while trying to thank a close friend called Frederik, a former player himself, who performed CPR on him when he collapsed.

'I was fortunate enough he had learned how to perform a CPR month after that because he wanted to become a firefighter,' Ginola explained.  

'He explained to me after that afterwards and he said, "it was strange because you were lying on the floor on your back. I was performing the CPR or I was pumping your chest and I was sweating and I was crying also because my friend was lying dead". 

'I wasn't there anymore. It was over. So he was pumping my chest while looking at my face and he said he was crying. He couldn't stop.'

Ginola, whose heart stopped for eight minutes before being revived, said it took him three weeks to phone his friend to thank him because he felt saying the words 'thank you' wouldn't be enough for saving his life.

'It takes me three weeks before I took my phone and I called [Frederik] Why? I said because for me to say thank you wasn't enough. It saved my life. It saved my kids, my family, my friends, all the grief, everything. Not just me, all the pain. It took away the pain of everyone saving me. 

'So I called him three weeks later and I said, "Fred, it took me three weeks to call you, but not because I forgot about you. I forget about you. It is just because I didn't know what to say. Now I know. I will not say just thank you, I just say, well, you will always have a special part in my mind". 

'And you know what he answered? He said he came back home and his son, he looked at his daddy and he said, dad, you are a hero. You saved someone's life. You saved David's life. And he cried in front of his kid and he said, "wow, OK, good for me that I learned that because now I can teach others how important it is".

David Ginola and Graeme Souness were speaking at the launch of the Every Minute Matters campaign, a year-long partnership between Sky Bet and the British Heart Foundation to inspire the nation to learn lifesaving CPR. Learn CPR in 15 minutes for FREE with British Heart Foundation’s online training course