Steve Cotterill believes no more can be done to analyse players' fitness and medical well-being.

The Clarets boss was speaking in light of his former player, Clive Clarke, suffering suspected heart failure during the half-time break of Leicester City's Carling Cup match at Nottingham Forest, which was abandoned as a result.

That incident happened on the day Sevilla's Antonio Puerta died, three days after suffering a heart attack in the opening match of the Spanish season against Getafe.

And in the week Zambian striker Chaswe Nsofwa collapsed and died during a practice match for Israeli second division outfit Hapoel Beer Sheva.

Both players were in their twenties, while on August 20, 16-year-old Walsall trainee Anton Reid suffered cardiac problems and died during a training session.

There have since been calls for screenings to be carried out on a more regular basis.

A decade ago, the Football Association and the Professional Footballers' Association joined forces to launch an initiative to screen the hearts of young footballers when they come into the game.

Two Accrington Stanley youngsters, Bobby Grant and Peter Murphy, underwent minor heart operations during pre-season, although not all abnormalities can be detected by an ECG screening.

Cotterill said he was relieved that Sunderland loanee Clarke, who was part of the Stoke City squad he managed during the 2002/03 season, was recovering, but fears it would be difficult to prevent similar situations arising in the future.

"I was absolutely devastated the other night when I heard about him, because I know him very, very well. I had him at Stoke," the Burnley boss said.

"I spoke to Tim Davies (Leicester City chief executive) at 8 o'clock on Wednesday morning, I thought that was the most appropriate time to ring.

"He said that obviously he had been very poorly but he was okay.

"We sent some flowers down yesterday and told him to look after himself and get well soon.

"With him having cardiac tests, I can't really ring him until he gets out of the hospital.

"James O'Connor's a good friend of his so he went down to see him (on Thursday) so we can only pass on our best wishes anyway, that I've already done anyway via two or three people that have gone in and seen him."

Clarke's agent, Gary Mellor, said that it appeared Clarke's heart stopped twice and a defibrillator had to be used after mouth-to-mouth rescusitation failed to work.

Cotterill added: "As regards tests, if you wanted to test young players on a regular basis, they would probably get fed up with it.

"Clive's played for so many years now and that's happened to him, so I don't know if there's any more tests that you can do."

Republic of Ireland international Clarke has made over 250 career appearances since starting out at Stoke City in August 1996.

"If all of a sudden we're going to see someone that's got to the extremities of where Clive got to the other night, where he's fatigued, a lot of players will get to that (stage) in a game, so I think you would have a lot of people who wouldn't perhaps be able to play or push themselves to a limit," Cotterill continued.

"We talk about a lot of things putting life into perspective, sometimes when your team's tired and they're hanging on the ropes and maybe someone makes a mistake, people and supporters, whatever, might realise now that when they are at fatigue, not only is their team in danger of conceding a goal, they're in danger themselves.

"So I just absolutely thank God that Dave Rennie (Leicester physio) did the fantastic job he did the other night to make sure Clive was all right.

"For his heart to stop beating, that is so major.

"We're just glad he's all right, as I'm sure the whole of football is, and our best wishes go to him and his family at these times."