Pickford was ‘provoked by jibes about his fiancee’
Jordan Pickford was provoked into the violent scenes which erupted outside a Sunderland bar after his antagonisers called his fiancee a “fat **** ”, it has emerged.
Witnesses have explained how a group of people had been goading the Everton and England goalkeeper throughout Sunday afternoon but that he finally erupted late in the evening when the abhorrent abuse was levelled at his fiancee Megan Davison.
Pickford, 25, was given permission to return to the northeast, where he grew up, after Everton’s 2-0 Premier League win against West Ham in London on Saturday night. He had initially planned to watch the Checkatrade Trophy final between his former club Sunderland against Portsmouth in the capital, but changed his plans to spend Mother’s Day with his and his fiancee’s family.
Video footage, which emerged on social media on Monday, showed Pickford being subjected to shouts of “small arms” and “butter fingers” earlier in the day, taunts which he attempted to take in good spirits and laugh off as he posed for pictures with fans, but it turned nastier much later when witnesses say that the insult was aimed at his fiancee.
Pickford and Davison are childhood sweethearts since meeting at school as teenagers and got engaged last year.
Northumbria police said they received a report at 12.19am on Monday morning of a scuffle between a large group of people on Tunstall Road, in Sunderland. No arrests were made but the police said their inquiries remain ongoing and they appealed for anyone to come forward with any information.
An off-duty bouncer is said to have been left with a black eye after he stepped in to try to calm Pickford down. Pickford was dragged from the scene and put into a taxi to take him home before the police arrived. Everton are also investigating the incident.