Not so jolly hockey night ends in Oxford pub brawl

AN ANNUAL event between Oxbridge hockey players dating back over a century ended in a brawl after a student dressed as a traffic cone hurled a chair off a pub balcony.

Sportsmen and women were celebrating after varsity matches between Oxford and Cambridge when a student in fancy dress picked up the chair and launched it from the upper floor of a Wetherspoon pub.

An Oxford men’s player was taken to hospital after being struck in the head and received stitches for the injury, while a Cambridge women’s player suffered minor injuries to her face, it was reported.

The incident took place last month at the Four Candles pub in Oxford.

The varsity matches, known as “the Best Day of the Year”, date back to 1890 and are known as the “pinnacle” of the two sides’ hockey calendars.

Pub celebrations this year drew hundreds before an Oxford student in a traffic cone costume threw the chair onto revellers below, according to Varsity, Cambridge’s student newspaper.

Venue staff intervened and tried to identify what had happened but the other members of the Oxford men’s team “closed ranks”, eyewitnesses said.

The managers eventually ordered everyone to leave, it is understood.

A student told that Oxford players were overheard discussing how the incident would make “great chat”.

One student told the newspaper that they were “all just drinking really and I don’t know why but one of them picked up a chair and chucked it over to the bottom floor.”

“Everyone was just quite confused”, a Cambridge student said. “There was just a lot of smashed glass all over the floor and the chair.”

Oxford University was approached for comment.