'I should have been blind' - Lionesses & Barcelona goalkeeper Ellie Roebuck opens up on 'miracle' recovery from stroke that left her fearing early retirement

Roebuck was found to have had an infarct in her left occipital lobe, which is a type of stroke, in January 2024, having felt like something was "not quite right" in the weeks before. She was just 24 years old at this time. The occipital lobe is the visual processing area of the brain and could have had a serious impact on her vision, something she told BBC Sport in an extensive interview she is "lucky" was not the case.

"I should have lost my vision," she said. "I should have lost my peripheral vision for sure. The majority of people that suffer a stroke [like mine] do that. So, I probably should have been blind, which is quite a miracle that that didn't happen."

Still, it left Roebuck fearing for her career, just two weeks after she had signed a pre-contract agreement with Barcelona, the European champions, ahead of a move from Manchester City that would take place in the summer.

"My first question was, 'Am I going to play football again?'" she said, though there was no immediate answer. "The nurses said you can't carry shopping for six weeks. You can't do any exercise. I thought, 'I'm a professional footballer, I can't do that'.

"I wouldn't walk my dog for like six weeks. I wouldn't leave the house. I was scared to do anything on my own. And that was never me, I was always super independent. My mum and dad were doing shifts of living with me in my one-bedroom flat in Manchester."

Roebuck then underwent tests to find out the cause of the stroke and a tiny hole in her heart was discovered. "[It] sounds crazy, but I was grateful that I had a hole in my heart because I'd found my reason and I knew that it could be closed and I could move on. I was almost excited that I was going in for heart surgery," she said.

However, in surgery, the hole was identified but a membrane had formed and doctors believed it had closed up by itself, which left Roebuck frustrated again as it meant she would never fully understand what caused her stroke.

She added: "You've almost got to think you've been given a second chance, but I'm also so angry that it happened, because I think, 'Why?'"

"I feel like I value life a lot more," Roebuck continued. "I was stuck in a real cycle of thinking football was everything and I think for that period of time where I didn't know if I could be a footballer, it made me realise, you have to find something else. And that was hard because my whole personality was Ellie the footballer.

"I didn't know if I was going play again so it was just a great way to channel my energy and have that focus to distract myself. It's a perfect way to start and eventually hopefully one day the aim is to have a coffee shop. The biggest struggle is becoming a normal human again but luckily I've nearly been able to do that."

Roebuck finally made her Barcelona debut in early December, with a second appearance for the Catalans following last month. Is an England return on her mind, then? The goalkeeper was part of the European Championship winning squad of 2022 and the team that reached the World Cup final in 2023, but hasn't been called up for almost 18 months due to these circumstances.

"It's difficult because that's something that's not in my hands as such," she said. "Nothing is given. I know that's not an easy journey. And I know that I need to be playing consistently week in, week out, but for me it's more than that, it's a journey that I'm on. Now I'm prioritising the things that are most important, and that's being the best goalkeeper I can possibly be."