A young West Ham striker has died after a three year battle
with testicular cancer. Dylan Tombides,
20, passed away today with his family at his bedside. The Australian footballer
was first diagnosed with cancer while representing Australia during the 2011
Under 17 World Cup in Mexico.
Perth-born Tombides was regarded as one of the most exciting
young players to come out of Australia after signing with West Ham as a
14-year-old. After being diagnosed with cancer he battled back to make his
first-team début in a League Cup match against Wigan in 2012. His death will be
marked by a minute's applause before West Ham's home match against Crystal
Palace this weekend.
John Hartson,
another footballer to have suffered, said that by the time he had spoken to doctors about the lumps he had
found on his testicles, his cancer had spread to his lungs and brain. The ex-footballer,
who is now assistant manager of the Welsh Football Association, said he had
waited four years before asking doctors to check the two lumps he had found. He
said: "I didn't know any of the signs or symptoms. I was fathering kids. I
was scoring goals. I was moving from club to club. But I had lumps on my
testicles. I wasn't aware that the cancer at that particular time was spreading
slowly." He told listeners it had started with small nut-sized lumps on
the outside of his testicles. But it wasn't until he had stated getting
intolerable headaches that he had gone to his GP, he said. "My message to
anyone who feels lumps down there is do as I say not as I did.”
Thanks to early diagnosis and successful treatment,
footballer Neil Harris beat
testicular cancer and was back playing for Millwall FC within months. The
striker, known as Bomber Harris, was Millwall's top scorer with 138 goals. In
2011 he signed for Southend and retired in June 2013.
"It was in June 2001. I'd just completed a great season
with Millwall. We'd won the old second division championship and I'd finished
as top scorer with 28 goals. There was speculation that I might be moving to a
Premiership club and everything was fantastic. Then one day I was watching
television with my hands resting in my shorts, as blokes tend to do. And as I
felt my testicles, I thought, 'This doesn't feel right.' One was bigger than
the other." He saw the club doctor
and was checked out immediately. "I had an operation, which was quite
straightforward, and afterwards I felt OK. Following the operation, I was lucky
enough to have radiotherapy rather than chemotherapy, so I didn't lose my hair.
Looking from the outside, you wouldn't have been able to tell that I was ill.
But if I hadn't caught my cancer early, it could have been a lot worse for me.
It could have been fatal."
"Well, fertility was one of my big worries. Chemotherapy
and radiotherapy can stop you having children, so in between the operation and
the radiotherapy, I had some sperm stored just in case. However, in the six
days between the operation and the start of the radiotherapy treatment, my wife
and I had sex twice and my wife conceived during that time. So losing one
testicle wasn't the end of the world because the other one took over. Since the
radiotherapy, we've had a second child, so I'm obviously still fertile." "I
was diagnosed in July 2001 and was back playing football in November. It turned
out that I'd rushed back a bit too quickly, so I needed another rest and then I
started again on January 1 2002. Although the cancer has given me a new perspective
on life, I still love my football."
"If you think anything might be wrong, just go to see
your GP. That's what they're there for. I understand that some men don't want
to go to a doctor for any reason, let alone such a serious one that involves
their private parts. But this is your life we're talking about. It takes a
bigger man to go and speak to his doctor than it does to pretend nothing is
wrong. So just go."
Bobby Moore survived testicular cancer before the World Cup in 1966 and played on afterwards for a decent time. He dealt with it quickly.
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