After testicular cancer surgery, Forge FC's Kyle Bekker wants men to 'listen to their body'

It was the slowest jog around a soccer pitch in his life but every second mattered over 10 minutes for Kyle Bekker. He had rejoined Forge FC in Hamilton and couldn’t have been happier.

Shortly before the workout, the 35-year-old midfielder gathered with teammates in the dressing room to inform them about his recent absence from the Canadian Premier League club.

“I had surgery four weeks ago [this past] Monday to remove a tumour after being diagnosed with testicular cancer,” Bekker revealed to Anastasia Bucsis of CBC Sports on Thursday after receiving biopsy results a day earlier.

“As of now, it seems like no chemotherapy, so now I’ve gotta start ramping things up and hopefully [return to game action] sooner than later. The start of a new journey, for sure.”

The reaction on the faces of Bekker’s teammates when told of his diagnosis spoke volumes. They are inside the 15 to 35 age range of being most susceptible to testicular cancer.

“[You think] ‘it could never be me — we’re healthy, we’re competing at a high level every day, we’re taking care of our bodies.’

“But the reality is, it’s not necessarily something you’re doing or not doing,” Bekker said. “It’s just the cards we’re dealt.”

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He was with Forge FC in Nuevo Leon, Mexico preparing to face Tigres UANL on Feb. 10 to complete a two-leg series in Round 1 of the CONCACAF Champions Cup when something felt wrong.

“One night I was getting ready for bed and I found a lump,” said Bekker, an Oakville, Ont., native. “In that moment I [knew] I had to listen to my body, reach out [to a medical professional] and get this taken care of.”

But understanding how hard he and his teammates had worked, he put his concern