A THUG has been jailed for 18 months after attacking a drinker who challenged him about a broken pub window.

Anthony Wakes admitted drinking 10 double vodkas and shots before launching a vicious attack on bus driver Darren Oliver in the Queen Anne pub on Junction Road, Deane.

The assault left Mr Oliver with a huge skull-deep gash on his forehead, which needed 10 stitches and has left him permanently scarred.

Lindsay Thomas, prosecuting, told the court how Mr Oliver had been drinking in the pub on February 13 and was standing outside at 12.30am when he heard a smashing noise and saw Wakes standing near a broken pub door window.

Wakes went back inside and Mr Oliver approached him at the bar, asking: "What are you playing at. Why have you done that?"

Wakes' friends separated the two men, but then Wakes lunged at Mr Oliver, hurling a woman out of the way to get to him.

"Both of them fell to the floor. The complainant was on his back and the defendant was raining down blows," said Mrs Thomas.

It is not known how Mr Oliver was injured, but when the crowd of people who had intervened to halt the attack dispersed, his head was pouring with blood.

Pub staff gave him a cloth to soak up the blood and Mr Oliver went outside, only to be followed by Wakes who continued the attack.

Mrs Thomas said that a witness saw Mr Oliver being punched in the face, but the victim told police that Wakes only attempted to hit him again.

Mr Oliver, who suffered a badly bruised and swollen left eye, went to hospital where doctors stitched the 5cm by 3cm cut in his forehead.

Martin Pizzey, defending said Wakes had been drinking heavily and cannot remember smashing the pub window.

"By his own description he was paralytic," said Mr Pizzey.

"He does not recognise himself. He is ashamed and embarrassed and is genuinely sorry. He was clearly influenced by the drink he consumed."

Wakes, aged 32, of Morris Green Lane, Daubhill, pleaded guilty to causing grievous bodily harm and criminal damage.

Mr Pizzey said Wakes, who works as a road repairer for United Utilities, "fully accepts his behaviour was outrageous."

Although Wakes was subject to a suspended prison sentence for producing cannabis at the time of the attack, Mr Pizzey stressed that it was his first offence of violence.

Sentencing Wakes to 18 months in prison, the Honorary Recorder of Bolton, Judge Timothy Clayson told him: "If you attack someone and knock them to the ground, you risk them sustaining a nasty injury, as happened here."