THE trial of a Saints star accused of assaulting a man in a city nightspot is due to begin today.

Striker Lee Barnard, pictured, is alleged to have attacked a reveller in Southampton’s now-closed White House during a night out with friends.

It is 18 months since the incident in the early hours of October 3, 2010, in which a man was left needing hospital treatment for facial injuries, but a series of legal delays has prevented the case being heard before now.

The 27-year-old footballer, of Channel Way, Ocean Village, is this morning due at Salisbury Crown Court, where he faces one charge of causing actual bodily harm.

His trial, which is expected to last four days, had been due to start on October 10 last year, but had to be abandoned because the Wiltshire court had no space for it.

The case is being heard at Salisbury Crown Court, which only has one working courtroom, after Barnard’s lawyers successfully argued he would not get a fair trial in Southampton.

Attempts have been made to switch the trial to other courts, including Dorchester, Bournemouth and Bristol, but none could fit it in their busy case lists.

Barnard has only made nine league and cup appearances for Southampton this season, having missed much of the campaign because of an ankle injury that ruled him out of the end of the St Mary’s club’s League One promotion push last year.

Finding himself down the pecking order behind Rickie Lambert and David Connolly, before the additions of Billy Sharp and Tadanari Lee, increased competition for attackers further, he has started just one match – away at Millwall in the FA Cup – and has yet to find the net this term. Barnard, who was an unused substitute in Saints’ home loss to Reading on Friday, was signed by Southampton for about £175,000 in January 2010 and has made more than 70 league and cup appearances, scoring 24 goals.