An Oxfordshire football team is to undertake CPR training after three players saved the life of a teammate who collapsed this summer.

Witney’s Slow Motion Football Club will receive CPR training tomorrow (Saturday, November 4) to ensure more have vital life-saving skills after Dr Nick Thomas suffered a heart attack and cardiac arrest during a weekly kickabout on August 10.

During the incident, three teammates undertook CPR chest compressions and utilised a defibrillator to resuscitate Dr Thomas until emergency help arrived. He was taken by ambulance from the Witney Artificial Turf Pitch in Gordon Way to the John Radcliffe Hospital. He awoke in hospital two days later and has since recovered.

Dr Thomas said: “It was a massive shock to wake up in intensive care and be told I’d had a cardiac arrest. I’ve got no previous history of heart issues. Knowing CPR can literally be a life-saver and I am proof of that.”

The training has been organised for club members and their partners at Milton-under-Wychwood Village Hall in Chipping Norton from 9.30am to 11am by fellow teammate Jeremy Habberley. It will be delivered by Dick Tracey, a former paramedic who served 24 years with South Central Ambulance Service.

Mr Tracey said: “If a person has a cardiac arrest and doesn’t receive CPR, their chances of survival decreases by ten per cent for every minute they wait for an ambulance. That means there is a ten minute window of opportunity to start CPR and potentially save a life.”