Tottenham star Danny Rose has admitted that he is fighting an ongoing battle with depression as he thanked England for taking the chance on him at the 2018 World Cup.
Rose, 27, is considered one of the Premier League's finest defenders, but he suffered a 2017-18 season full of injury setbacks and off-field controversy.
He played just 10 times during Spurs' Premier League campaign and was also fined for criticising his club's transfer policy during the 2017 summer transfer window.
And now he has confessed he has been seeing a psychologist after being diagnosed with the disease.
“It’s no secret that I’ve been through a testing time at Tottenham this season, which led to me seeing a psychologist, and I was diagnosed with depression, which nobody knows about, and I had to get away from Tottenham,” Rose explained to the Independent in a frank interview.
“I’m lucky that England gave me that opportunity to get away, refresh my mind and I’ll always be grateful to them.
“I was on medication for a few months – again, nobody knows about that apart from my agent – but I’m off the medication now, I’m good now and looking forward to how far we can go in Russia.”
According to Rose, his troubles began at the start of 2017, when a knee injury went without adequate treatment and left him unable to play.
“It all stemmed from my injury in January last year, when I was advised I didn’t need an operation. I don’t know how many tablets I took to try and get fit for Tottenham, how many injections trying to get fit for Tottenham," he added.
“I had cortisone/PRP [platelet rich plasma] injections trying to be fit for my club, and I had to have an op four months down the line – after all that football I missed, when the team was flying and I was playing well, I was playing really well, the team were playing really well. Seeing the lads beat Arsenal comfortably, seeing them beat Man United comfortably – it was hard. I’m not saying I’ve had worse treatment than anyone else. That’s football. But it was difficult. That was the start of it.
“Nobody knows this, either, but my uncle hung himself in the middle of my rehab, and that triggered it [depression] as well. It was really hard, and being referred to a doctor and psychologist [by the Spurs doctor] helped me massively to cope.
“I’ve been through a lot, and England has been my salvation. One million per cent."
