THE victim of an unprovoked assault outside a Bolton bar is questioning why police are not investigating the attack.

Rhys Farnworth was outside Shots bar, Bradshawgate, at around 3am Thursday, July 27, when a man he did not know came up to him and a friend and started 'shouting and swearing'.

The 21-year-old said that the man was 'ranting about how he was the hardest person in Bolton' and that he just humoured him before turning away.

Then, 'out of nowhere' the man swung his elbow into the face of Mr Farnworth, before running away from the scene.

Mr Farnworth, who lives in Brookland Grove in Heaton, grabbed a nearby taxi to hospital, where he was told he had suffered a broken nose in the attack.

The bar worker has been left with two black eyes as a result of the attack.

Later on Thursday he rang the police and was told that someone would ring him back a bit later on in the day.

However, when the police called again, they told him they would not be investigating.

Mr Farnworth said: "When they rang again they said there is nothing they can do as they don't have the manpower.

"I phoned again and said I wanted to complain. They said they would get back to me 24 hours later."

He added that they are still yet to return his call.

The issue of police manpower has been widely discussed in the wake of the Manchester Arena bombing with figures earlier this year showing that 6,297 officers are employed by GMP, compared with 8,148 in 2010.

Mr Farnworth said: "It is concerning really. I have not had a phone call or anything. They didn't even have a look at the CCTV.

"They should have done something about it. Something needs to happen. How serious does something have to be for the police to investigate. People have to be deterred from doing this sort of thing."

He also raised concerns about a lack of police officers in Bolton town centre at night.

He said: "There used to see them quite a bit in the town. I haven't seen the police in a good few months to be honest."

A number of incidents this year, including McCauleys bar having its licence suspended has seen people raise concerns about the lack of police officers in the town centre.

Cuts mean that GMP has less officers to patrol the streets in the evening.

Officers now respond to the town centre when they are called.