Heroic rugby coach jumps into the stands to save fan’s life

His team went on to lose, but does that really matter?

A rugby coach in France is being hailed as a hero after jumping into the stands during a match to save a fan’s life. 

Jonathan Laskowski, the coach of Racing Club Cubzaguais, was on the sideline during Monday’s game against Rugby Club Béarnais when a Béarnais supporter suffered an apparent heart attack, according to the Sud-Ouest newspaper.

Laskowski, a volunteer firefighter, leapt into the crowd and began performing chest compressions. The fan’s pulse returned, but then the heart stopped again. That’s when Cubzaguais’s bus driver, another volunteer firefighter named Ludovic Jourdan, and a reserve Béarnais player, a volunteer firefighter named Vincent Vilard, sprung into action with Laskowski to use a defibrillator on the victim. 

The trio of rescuers performed live-saving techniques for 20 minutes until emergency services arrived. 

Laskowski’s team led 11–10 in the second half when the spectator fell ill and went on to lose 15–11, not that it mattered to him, though. 

“We lost the match, but there are much more important things in life,” Laskowski told Sud-Ouest.