Trampling at Hallaton bottle kicking event leaves woman unable to walk

A woman says she has been left unable to walk after she was accidentally trampled by players participating in an annual Easter Monday tradition.

Alexie Winship said she was among spectators watching the Hallaton bottle kicking event in Leicestershire, where players attempt to wrestle wood kegs through a field to win.

The 23-year-old was caught up in a scrum and seriously injured. At hospital, she was found to have suffered a neurological injury and a bleed on her spine, which has left her without most feeling below her waist.

Ms Winship, who remains in hospital, said she could not remember much of what happened.

“I was on the outskirts [of the players], just watching when a beer keg came flying out in my direction,” Ms Winship said.

“I couldn’t get out of the way. I was with friends who said I got kicked in the head, knocked out, and then trampled on.

“It was like a stampede. One of my friends pulled me out and I was blue-lighted to hospital.”

Bottle kicking takes place in a field between neighbouring villages Hallaton and Medbourne. It has few rules, but is won when players are able to carry two of three barrels across a stream back to their village.

Two of the “bottles” contain beer, while one is completely wooden – painted red and white – and is referred to as the dummy.

Organisers have said local legend suggested the event, preceded by a procession through Hallaton in which hare pies are scattered, can trace its roots back 2,000 years.

Ms Winship told the BBC she had planned to run a half-marathon on Sunday, but her injuries had “thrown a spanner in the works”.

She added while she was a spectator, she “never intended” to get involved in the action.

“I can’t feel anything below my waist. I can’t walk,” she said.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen and that’s the scary thing. I’m an active, fit and healthy person.”

Ms Winship, who works in retail, has been told she will recover, but that it would be “a long-term thing” and that she was facing “months” using a wheelchair.

She added she wanted people to be aware of the risks of attending the event.

“I wasn’t standing particularly close,” she said. “We were a few metres away but it surged so quickly towards us.

“They [the players] were looking at the keg, not where they were going. I know it was an accident.

“Maybe they could have marshals to make it safer.”

Phil Allan, chairman of the bottle kicking organising committee, said he wished Ms Winship a “full recovery”.

He added people were warned well in advance of the risks of entering the field of play.

“We don’t want anyone to get hurt but you do get the odd injury – it’s an age-old problem,” Mr Allan said.

“We’ve looked at all sorts of things but you can’t marshal it. It’s an unpredictable event.

“We put posters up around the field telling people they enter at their own risk so they are warned. And we pay for ambulances and paramedics to attend in case anyone does get hurt.”

Bottle kicking is not the only peculiar rough-and-tumble English tradition that comes with a risk of injury.

Paramedics are deployed to the annual cheese rolling event in Gloucestershire, where participants chase a 7lb (3kg) Double Gloucester down a steep 200-yard hill, many tripping and tumbling as they go.

Medics have also been required to treat players hurt during Royal Shrovetide Football, which takes place annually in Ashbourne in Derbyshire, as the Up’Ards and Down’Ards compete to move a ball to opposite ends of the town.