{"id":442789,"date":"2026-01-28T11:14:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-28T11:14:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/442789\/"},"modified":"2026-01-28T11:14:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T11:14:10","slug":"french-rugby-star-uini-atonio-in-icu-after-suffering-cardiac-event","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/442789\/","title":{"rendered":"French rugby star Uini Atonio in ICU after suffering \u2018cardiac event\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">New Zealand-born French rugby star Uini Atonio is recovering in intensive care after suffering a cardiac event, his club La Rochelle have announced.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">The 35-year-old has been retired effective immediately just days out from the Six Nations opener.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">La Rochelle said Atonio was admitted to hospital on Tuesday \u201cfollowing a suspected heart problem\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-178igh4-StyledParagraph e1s06mna1\">Know the news with the 7NEWS app: <a class=\"css-h2mhmv-StyledContextualLink e1s06mna0\" href=\"https:\/\/7news.com.au\/app?utm_source=7NEWS&amp;utm_medium=contextual-link-app&amp;utm_campaign=7news-app\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Download today Arrow<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">\u201cMedical examinations confirmed a cardiac event,\u201d the club said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">\u201cHis condition is now stable, and he remains in intensive care under observation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">\u201cFollowing his hospitalisation, Uini will have to undergo a long period of recovery. It is now established that he will not be able to continue his playing career.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">\u201cUini holds a special place in the history and in the heart of our club. This news deeply saddens us.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">\u201cThe entire club wishes to express its unwavering and total support to him and his family during this difficult time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">Atonio helped lead France to a grand slam in the 2022 Six Nations and the 2025 triumph.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-1n6q21n-StyledParagraph e4e0a020\">Recognised as one of La Rochelle\u2019s greatest players, he played a key role in their back-to-back Champions Cup victories in 2022-23.<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"css-6fiqrm-StyledLinkWrapper e1y7kr221\" href=\"https:\/\/7news.com.au\/sport\/tennis\/heartbreaking-scenes-as-title-contender-lorenzo-musetti-suddenly-quits-australian-open-against-novak-djokovic-c-21453236\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><\/p>\n<p>\u2018Heartbreaking scenes\u2019 as title contender suddenly quits Australian Open<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-xp0jgm-StyledTimeToRead e1y7kr223\">2 min read<\/p>\n<p><\/a><a class=\"css-6fiqrm-StyledLinkWrapper e1y7kr221\" href=\"https:\/\/7news.com.au\/sport\/tennis\/australian-open-scandal-explodes-with-fitness-tracking-company-shipping-underwear-devices-to-stars-c-21450637\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><\/p>\n<p>Aus Open \u2018scandal\u2019 explodes with fresh \u2018strip search\u2019 threat<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-xp0jgm-StyledTimeToRead e1y7kr223\">3 min read<\/p>\n<p><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Zealand-born French rugby star Uini Atonio is recovering in intensive care after suffering a cardiac event, his&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":442790,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,2633,588,85],"class_list":["post-442789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-rugby-union","tag-sport","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=442789"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442789\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/442790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=442789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=442789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=442789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}