A MAN accused of slashing the throat of a neighbour and leaving him for dead told a court yesterday he had nothing to do with the attack.

Paul Ryan, 37, is said to have carried out the near-fatal assault on Craig Beddow, 23, as retribution for a burglary at his Hartlepool home.

Mr Ryan told the jury yesteday of his movements in the hours before the attack, shortly after midnight on July 15, last year.

He had been ten-pin bowling with friends, then drinking in a social club, before returning home at about 10.45pm, where his wife, Tracey, had been entertaining friends.

Police arrived at their home, in Seaton Lane, at 1.30am - an hour after Mr Beddow had been slashed across his neck and chest on the doorstep of his home nearby.

Teesside Crown Court heard that Mr Beddow, who needed 27 pints of blood and had the last rites read to him in hospital, identified Mr Ryan as his assailant.

When police arrived at Mr Ryan's home, they found the T-shirt and jeans he had been wearing in the washing machine, and his trainers wrapped in a towel in a cupboard after an attempt to clean them in the bath.

Giving evidence yesterday, Mr Ryan said someone had spilled a drink on him in the club, and his white training shoes were looking grubby.

The jury heard that tiny particles of blood which matched Mr Beddow's were found on the footwear.

Mr Ryan said that two weeks before the attack, he had bumped into Mr Beddow and punched him several times. Mr Ryan said Mr Beddow spat at him, and the blood must be from that altercation.

Mr Ryan denies attempted murder and the case continues.