A MAN who seriously injured his ankle during a football match had to be taken to hospital by car as there were no ambulances available.

On Tuesday, September 9 a Slimbridge FC player, Jack Twyman, was badly injured during a cup match at Almondsbury UWE, who play near Almondsbury.

Colin Gay, secretary of the club, said that he was waiting for an ambulance for almost half an hour before being told they should take him to hospital by car.

“When I initially called we were told to reassure the patient and to elevate his leg and that an ambulance was on its way.

“About 10 minutes later I was called by a lady in the 999 control room who asked whether the site was easy to access and when I said it was down a country lane they told me to wait by the main road to direct the ambulance.

“After another 10 minutes or so I got another call and they discussed the injury with Jack and they said that we should take him to hospital ourselves.

“We then had to put him in the back of the car and drive him to hospital in Gloucester.”

Members of the club then decided that, rather than waiting for longer and as there was no sign of an ambulance, they would drive him to hospital in Gloucester.

Mr Gay believes that the clinician that spoke to Mr Twyman on the phone made the wrong decision and that the service now knew it was wrong.

He said: "At the time we were more concerned about Jack because he was in a lot of pain. It wasn't until I woke up in the morning that I realised how ridiculous it was.

"The whole thing is concerning and quite depressing, they made the wrong assessment over the phone and I think once they realised how bad his injuries were they knew they were wrong.

A spokesman for the South Western Ambulance Service said: “We received a call just after 9pm saying that a man had injured his ankle and then a clinician in our 999 control room talked with the caller and the patient.

“It was decided that they would take the patient to Gloucester because it was closer to his family, but we would have taken him to Southmead as it was the closest hospital to where the patient was.

“We have a 30 minute response time so the patient wasn’t overly delayed.”

When his injuries were examined in hospital it turned out that he had broken the bone and damaged the ligaments in his ankle.

Mr Twyman is now out of hospital and was watching from the sidelines as Slimbridge FC played their latest match – a 2-1 win against Cadbury Heath on Saturday, September 13.