ROVERS keeper Brad Friedel today said Stig Bjornebye would be sorely missed around Ewood following his decision to quit football.

Bjornebye announced he was retiring from the game on medical grounds earlier this week after finally conceding defeat in his brave battle to overcome a serious eye injury.

And Friedel has revealed the whole squad was devastated to hear the news of the popular Norwegian's plight as they prepared for this afternoon's game against Arsenal.

"I've played football with Stig for over five years now," said Friedel.

"We were both at Liverpool together and then we both came here at roughly the same time so it was a sad day for me to hear that he's had to retire.

"He's a fantastic individual and a great professional who's got a great family and a great head on his shoulders.

"So he will succeed in life at whatever he does, make no mistake about that.

"At the end of the day, I'm sure he's thinking in his own mind that there's more things in life than just playing a game.

"But he will be missed by a lot of us when he does eventually go back home.

"He's been a great friend to me and a great player over the years."

Bjornebye's nightmare began 11 months ago when he suffered an orbital blow out fracture as a result of a freak training accident.

Since then, he's had two separate operations to try and correct the problem and at one point he looked on course to make a successful recovery when he appeared in a Worthington Cup tie against Wigan in December.

But he continued to suffer from double vision and he was then dealt a further devastating blow when he had to have surgery on a freak foot injury.

Eventually, he decided to quit on medical advice but Ewood team-mate Craig Short knows just how hard he had worked to save his career.

"Stig is my sort of age, we get on really well, he's a very, very good professional and I know he's worked very, very hard to try and overcome this," said Short.

"He's probably done more than any other injured player and he's had a lot of help from the medical staff as well.

"To suffer one freak injury is bad enough but to get two in the space of a year is terrible.

"I think he's relieved now, though, that he's finally made his decision because it's probably the right thing to do.

"It was a really nasty injury and to play for another year or two probably wouldn't have been worth it."

Bjornebye is planning to return to Norway with his family where he aims to pursue a couple of property ventures.

But he has not ruled out the possibility of returning to football one day, possibly in England.