Cardiff City footballer died after falling down stairs in drunken pub ‘play fight’

FORMER Cardiff City midfielder Peter Whittingham died after falling down stairs at a pub following a drunken “play fight” with friends, an inquest has been told.

Whittingham, 35, suffered a traumatic head injury at the Park Hotel pub in Barry, Vale of Glamorgan, on March 7, and died in hospital 11 days later after failing to regain consciousness.

Yesterday, the coroner’s court in Pontypridd, south Wales, heard the former England Under-21 international had gone drinking with his wife’s brother and a friend to watch last year’s England vs Wales Six Nations match.

CCTV captured Whittingham engaging in “horseplay” with the pair in a corridor, before he appeared to lose his balance and walked through a fire door off-camera and fell down eight steps and hit his head just after 9.30pm.

Whittingham’s wife and mother to their two young boys, Amanda Whittingham, told the hearing he left their home around 3pm without eating since breakfast as he was in a

“rush” to catch the game.

Whittingham’s brother-in-law Robert Williams said the pair and friend Ryan Taylor had been drinking lager, bitter, and tequila during the afternoon and evening.

But he said the evening was a “blackout”, and had no memory of the ex-footballer falling.

Dr Christopher Hingston, an intensive care consultant at University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff , said Whittingham had a Glasgow coma score of three – the lowest possible score and meaning he was completely unresponsive – during his admission.

Whittingham suffered a subdural haematoma, as well as bleeding and swelling inside his brain.