Ex-England defender Stuart Pearce was sent well-wishes by former club Nottingham Forest during its Premier League match on Saturday after reportedly falling ill and being hospitalized last weekend.
The 62-year-old Pearce suffered a medical emergency on board a flight to London from the United States, Britain’s Press Association reported. After he received treatment, a decision was made to make an emergency landing in Canada where Pearce is recovering in the hospital, PA reported.
Pearce calls matches for British radio station talkSPORT alongside commentator Sam Matterface, who was at the City Ground for the match between Forest and Manchester City — two of Pearce's old clubs.
“I spoke to him yesterday, he’s in great spirits,” Matterface said of Pearce ahead of the game. “He isn’t 100%, that is definitely the case, but he is in the right place, he is in the hospital. They are dealing with it.”
A message reading “Get Well Soon Stuart” was displayed on the big screen at the City Ground after three minutes of the Forest-City game. Pearce, a left back, used to wear No. 3 on his jersey.
“Stuart is not just a legend of our club, he is part of our family,” Forest manager Nuno Espirito Santo said after the 1-0 win over City. “We all send him our very best wishes and hope he has a full and fast recovery.”
Matterface said Pearce was frustrated at not being able to come to the match.
“He actually said to me, ‘I have got so much I had to cancel. Some great games, and Mumford & Sons are playing on Wednesday night and I can’t go now,’" Matterface said. "He wasn’t happy about that. He is in good spirits.”
Pearce made 401 appearances for Forest during a 12-year stint and also played for Coventry, Newcastle, West Ham and Man City, where he was later the manager.
He played 78 times for England, including in the semifinals of the 1990 World Cup when he had a penalty saved in a shootout defeat to West Germany.
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A tribute to former Nottingham Forest and Manchester City player Stuart Pearce is displayed in the third minute on the big screen follow his health scare during the English Premier League soccer match at the City Ground, Nottingham, Saturday March 8, 2025. (Mike Egerton/PA via AP)
Retired professional baseball player Lenny Dykstra faces charges after Pennsylvania State Police said a trooper found drugs and paraphernalia in his possession during a traffic stop on New Year's Day.
Dykstra, 62, was a passenger when the vehicle was pulled over by a trooper with the Blooming Grove patrol unit in Pike County, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) east of Scranton, where Dykstra lives.
Police said in a statement that charges will be filed but did not specify what they may be or what drugs were allegedly involved.
Matthew Blit, Dykstra’s lawyer, said in a statement that the vehicle did not belong to Dykstra and he was not accused of being under the influence of a substance at the scene.
“To the extent charges are brought against him, they will be swiftly absolved,” Blit said.
Dykstra's gritty style of play over a long career with the New York Mets and Philadelphia Phillies earned him the nickname “Nails.” He spent years as a businessman before running into a series of legal woes.
Dykstra served time in a California prison for bankruptcy fraud, sentenced to more than six months for hiding baseball gloves and other items from his playing days. That ran concurrent with a three-year sentence for pleading no contest to grand theft auto and providing a false financial statement. He claimed he owed more than $31 million and had only $50,000 in assets.
In April 2012, Dykstra pleaded no contest to exposing himself to women he met through Craigslist.
In 2019, Dykstra pleaded guilty on behalf of his company, Titan Equity Group, to illegally renting out rooms in a New Jersey house that it owned. He agreed to pay about $3,000 in fines.
That same year a judge dropped drug and terroristic threat charges against Dykstra after an altercation with an Uber driver. Police said they found cocaine, MDMA and marijuana among his belongings. Dykstra's lawyer called that incident “overblown” and said he was innocent.
And in 2020 a New York Supreme Court judge dismissed a defamation lawsuit that Dykstra filed against former Mets teammate Ron Darling over his allegation that Dykstra made racist remarks toward an opponent during the 1986 World Series.
Justice Robert D. Kalish said Dykstra’s reputation “for unsportsmanlike conduct and bigotry” had already been so tarnished that it could not be damaged further.
“Based on the papers submitted on this motion, prior to the publication of the book, Dykstra was infamous for being, among other things, racist, misogynist, and anti-gay, as well as a sexual predator, a drug-abuser, a thief, and an embezzler,” Kalish wrote.
FILE - Former baseball player Lenny Dykstra sits during his sentencing for grand theft auto in Los Angeles, on Dec. 3, 2012. (AP Photo/Nick Ut, File)
