TWO thugs brutally attacked a young man in a nightclub — because he beat their arcade game score.

Gareth Fitzsimmons had been using a games machine on which players pay £1 to thump a punch bag three times.

But when he beat the score set by two men nearby they set on him.

Mr Fitzsimmons, aged 22, from Great Lever, suffered a shattered jaw after being repeatedly kicked in the head.

He is being cared for at the Royal Blackburn Hospital where experts have said he faces hours of surgery to wire parts of his face back together.

Mr Fitzsimmons was on a night out with friends to celebrate his birthday at Liquid nightclub in Blackburn when the attackers struck at about midnight on Saturday night.

Full story in The Bolton News