Chart-topping Birmingham band talks dream ‘born out of council house bedroom’<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\nThe Scouser was left with a broken hand and cheekbone after visiting Liberty’s nightclub on the Hagley Road with his brother and friends after one of his first games for Blues.<\/p>\n
Unaware Liberty’s had a reputation for being a Villa nightclub, Ward was ‘battered’ by nightclub doormen, he said.<\/p>\n
![\"Birmingham](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/0_TRMRMMGLPICT000019537910.jpg\")
Birmingham City midfielder Mark Ward is beaten to the ball by Cambridge United full back Matt Joseph(Image: Independent)<\/p>\n
Speaking on the podcast, Ward said: “I got a terrible hiding there (Liberty’s) one night and I think it was the first night game on a Tuesday.<\/p>\n
“No one told me, that as a Blue, you couldn’t go there.<\/p>\n
“My brother was down from Liverpool and a couple of mates \u2013 we’d won the game \u2013 but we ended up getting bullied big time.<\/p>\n
“We got battered by the bouncers who were there.<\/p>\n
“I was in a bad way, I broke my hand and my cheekbone.<\/p>\n
“I woke up looking at my brother and I thought he’d been in a car crash. That’s how bad he was.”<\/p>\n
After an unexpected start to his Birmingham City career, Ward recalled a phone call from then-managing director Karren Brady who advised Ward not to visit Liberty’s again.<\/p>\n
He continued: “She said: ‘people should have told you not to go there because it’s an Aston Villa club.’<\/p>\n
“They got my hand sorted out and I ended up playing against Swansea on the Saturday.<\/p>\n
“That wasn’t a good start, but it got better after that.”<\/p>\n
Ward left Birmingham City in 1996 for Huddersfield before retiring in 1999. Liberty’s closed in 2007 and the building is now occupied by Indian restaurant chain Akbar’s.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The winger broke his hand and cheekbone on a night out after failing to do his homework on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":546595,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7820],"tags":[855,1205,103628,748,10387,393,4884,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-546594","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-birmingham","8":"tag-birmingham","9":"tag-birmingham-city-fc","10":"tag-birmingham-nightclubs","11":"tag-britain","12":"tag-edgbaston","13":"tag-england","14":"tag-great-britain","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115486793017520909","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546594","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=546594"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546594\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/546595"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=546594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=546594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=546594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/0_JS341988202.jpg\")
A former Birmingham City player was ‘battered’ by bouncers after one of his first games<\/p>\n