THE schoolgirl at the centre of the Adam Johnson child sex trial had suicidal thoughts as she revealed the allegations to her father, a court heard today (Friday).

Bradford Crown Court was told the £60,000-a-week former Sunderland player had manipulated the 15-year-old girl for sexual activity in a classic case of grooming "in its purest form".

In the prosecution's closing speech on the trial's 11th day, Kate Blackwell QC described Johnson as "unscrupulous" in having groomed the girl into a position where she had felt a sense of approval following her meetings with the footballer and said he had "demonstrated his exceptional duplicity" while cheating on his girlfriend.

She said the schoolgirl had broken down with her father after rumours about the allegation spiralled out of control on social media and the teenager had told him that she "wanted to die".

Ms Blackwell said the simultaneous messages Johnson sent to the teenager and his girlfriend highlighted the type of character he was.

She added: "It epitomises the sort of man that would commit the sort of offences on this indictment.

"Adam Johnson is someone who had a wealth of experience of sending flirty messages to adult women. He has lied and lied and lied again.

"He's a self-confessed arrogant man who throws himself at your mercy and asks you to accept that his contrition for what he has done is genuine.

"But we expect you have seen through his transparent cloak of rectitude. It doesn't take much to lift the material and peek inside to the core of deceit and lies."

The 28-year-old has admitted grooming and kissing the girl, but denies that further sex acts took place in a car park behind a Chinese takeaway, in Wingate, County Durham.

Orlando Pownall QC, summing up the defence case, said everybody involved in the events last January had been "a loser".

Mr Pownall said: "Whatever you might think about her (the schoolgirl's) contribution to the events that unfolded, she was a child and deserved protection.

"The fact that she appears to have been willing and appears, to some extent, to have been star-struck is no difference."

Mr Pownall urged the jury to consider why Johnson had initially been reluctant to tell police the whole story.

He said: "Look through his eyes, the panic of the moment, arrested in a police station. Sometimes people do lie out of panic. The defendant's world was turned upside down at the police station."

He added the allegations had resulted in "public humiliation" for Johnson. "Sometimes people lie for shame or embarrassment."

He said the subject of lying lay at the heart of the case.

The trial continues.