Soccer-Stott rejoins W-League's Melbourne City after fighting cancer

(Reuters) - New Zealand defender Rebekah Stott will return to W-League club Melbourne City this season after battling stage 3 Hodgkin lymphoma, a type of cancer, the club said on Thursday.

Former Brighton & Hove Albion player Stott said in March she would need to go through four months of chemotherapy after being diagnosed with the condition.

Melbourne City said the 28-year-old is now in complete remission after undergoing treatment in Australia.

Stott trained with semi-professional club Bulleen Lions last month before deciding to rejoin Melbourne City, where she won four Championships and two Premiership titles from 2015-2020.

"It's an incredible feeling for me to have football back and I definitely didn't realise how much I'd missed it until I got back on the pitch," Stott said in a club statement https://www.melbournecityfc.com.au/news/rebekah-stott-re-joins-melbourne-city-fc-w-league-squad.

Stott represented Australia at youth level before switching allegiance to New Zealand, her country of birth. She has earned 81 caps for the 'Football Ferns'.

(Reporting by Manasi Pathak in Bengaluru; Editing by Peter Rutherford)