A WALKER taking a shortcut was attacked and brutally beaten with a bottle during an unprovoked attack.

Matthew Nardolilli suffered a fractured eye socket, nose and spine during the incident on Whitegate Road.

The 33-year-old told the Echo it was about 7.15pm when he noticed one man, and then another both acting strangely.

Mr Nardolilli, from Southend, said: “I was approached by one guy who I thought was going to rob me. A second guy then approached me with his hood up, trying to hide his face.

“The second guy kept threatening me saying, ‘what are you gonna do’ and then repeatedly hit me.

“I went to the floor and there was blood everywhere, it was running out of me like a tap.

“My eye was squirting with blood and I think I got bottled, I have a massive lump on my head and there was glass on the floor.

“He said to me ‘don’t make me stab you’.

“I’d lost so much blood I was very disorientated and dizzy, but I managed to call my girlfriend who came to help me.

“My eye is so inflamed I can’t see out of it.”

He was taken by ambulance to Broomfield Hospital, where he saw a specialist doctor and is now being treated at Southend Hospital. He is still in a lot of pain and has suffered a bleed on the eye, which will take six to eight weeks to heal. He will have to have his nose broken back into place.

Mum Janice Basham, 51, said: “I was devastated when I heard the news, I just wanted to cry.

“I don’t know how someone could do that to anybody, I feel so sick knowing I can’t do anything for him and can’t stand seeing him in so much pain.

“I cant believe how bad crime in Southend has got, you aren’t safe anywhere now.”

A spokesman for Essex Police said: “We were called to reports a man had been assaulted in Whitegate Road, Southend at around 7.30pm on Sunday.

“It was reported a man in his 30s had suffered a broken nose and an eye injury and was being treated by paramedics.” Anyone with information call Essex Police on 101 quoting incident 42.6977/19.