Question number one then, Doug McLaughlan – what’s it like to get hit in the skull with a machete? – (Laughing) Yeah man, that shit’s nice mate, real tasty.

Right then, I guess we’d better take this one back to the start. How did this whole situation come about? What were you doing in the time leading up to the attack? – My brother and I had got fucking harassed cycling down the road in Bradford. We were just riding home with the bikes, next thing some car comes past and started shouting some shit so we told them to get fucked…you know, ”fuck off”, like that. The car’s burned off then comes back with two more cars, three more cars, something like that, and they were trying to crash us into the railings and shit, coming up right close. I had my bike with my shopping on the front of it, you know what I mean – I wasn’t trying to start a fight.

We thought we’d get off the road and take a little backstreet. It was dark by that time. We took this little alleyway and it was well gnarly, it was pitch black. So we fly down this snicket and burn round this corner. We thought we’d call for this geezer that we know who lived close. We come up this driveway and we’re about to get off our bikes…

Were you still fleeing from the cars at this point? – Yeah we were fleeing; we could hear the cars still burning around so we thought we’d fly up this alley. My bro had the bike lock on his bike as well so we figured we’d chain the bikes up and go and see He-Man up the top, but it didn’t work out like that.

We flew up this alley and all of a sudden people came jumping out on us, then out of nowhere, ‘whack!’ straight over the head, and I’m thinking, “Fuck! What was that? Have I banged my head on something?” then there’s this guy right in front of me, straight up trying to hack me up with a machete.

No remorse, no holding back, fully trying to hack you up? – He didn’t say anything. No asking, “Who are you?” or anything like that – just straight chopping at me. We came burning up this alley just to leave our bikes and this guy comes jumping out the bushes with a machete. Then there was loads of them jumping out…it was fucking mental, man.

I managed to block a couple of hits but I was falling backwards off my bike, and I had my bag of shopping on the front with some milk, eggs, bacon, bread and shit like that. They had machetes; one of the guys had an axe. He dropped it and the police found that shit on the floor so I thought I’d been hit in the head with an axe; that sent me a bit wobbly.

Honestly, it came on top so quick. I got whacked two times then I got whacked from behind on the opposite side of my head but that must have been with a fucking bat or something because it knocked me flying.

I took my bike and I threw it at the guy with a machete as well and it hit him and knocked him over, but then someone came in again from the next side…it was relentless, man.