Robbie Williams spent seven days in intensive care after “abnormalities” were found in his brain in September

Now, Robbie has admitted his hospitalisation was more serious than it appeared, as after a health scare backstage in Zurich at the beginning of September, he was immediately rushed to an intensive care unit (ICU).

He said: “My left arm went numb and I couldn’t stop dribbling out of the side of my mouth. I had a headache and I was also having trouble breathing. I couldn’t get a full breath.

“After the show, my arm was still numb and my mouth was still dribbling. I saw myself as a soldier. I needed to finish what I’d started out, and I was going to go to Russia for the final two shows no matter what shape I was in.”

Before flying out to Russia to continue his tour, the 43-year-old singer stopped off in London for some emergency tests, where doctors discovered what appeared to be “blood” on his brain.

He continued: “I had blood tests done, and I had various scans including ones of my heart and my brain, and there were some abnormalities found, including something on my brain that looked like blood.

“That was obviously very scary, so the decision was taken out of my hands and I was sent straight to the intensive care unit. It’s very weird to go from being on tour to suddenly being in intensive care, but that’s where I found myself.”

Robbie also revealed his wife Ayda and their children Teddy, five, and Charlie, three, were in Los Angeles at the time and so were unable to see him during his troubling time.

However, he star was surrounded by medical professionals who took care of his every need, and after spending a week in ICU, he was given the all clear to head home, where he spent two months recovering.

Speaking to The Sun newspaper, he said: “[Ayda] couldn’t see me, and there I was in a little bed, attached to tubes. But in the ICU I was surrounded by people who were caring for me, in every sense of the word, 24 hours a day.

“I was confused and scared, but I knew I was in the right place. And, maybe naively, I felt like I knew I was going to be OK.

“They monitored me and gave me an MOT, basically. They checked everything out and eventually, after seven days, they said that I was fit to leave the ICU. After that, I still had to have a final scan to check that I was okay to fly.

“I was told to do nothing stressful for a few weeks - just to be, and sleep, and treat myself nicely.”