Terry Coles was approaching the ground when he was fatally injured

Swansea City supporter Terry Coles, 42, died of abdominal wounds after trouble broke out before opposing fans before a league match at Rotherham United's Millmoor ground in May 2000.

A mounted police officer carrying out crowd control told the hearing at Doncaster Magistrates Court on Tuesday that the collision with Mr Coles was unavoidable after the fan walked into the horse's path.

The jury has been directed to consider a range of verdicts, including accidental death, unlawful killing or an open verdict.

Doncaster and Rotherham Coroner Stanley Hooper summed up evidence from a number of witnesses which has taken eight days to present.

'Mayhem'

The jury was told how Mr Coles had travelled to Rotherham with a group of other Swansea fans in a minibus.

After debate about how much Mr Coles had had to drink during the journey to south Yorkshire, friends of his told how they had been drinking before the game and that Mr Coles had probably drunk seven pints.

Post mortem examination tests showed Mr Coles was four times over the drink-drive limit at the time of his death.

But it was as the Swansea fans made their way to the ground that trouble broke out.

Police officers - who told the hearing that Mr Coles appeared to have "walked into the path of the police horse" - said he was seen on CCTV footage throwing objects into the stadium.

But Keith Hill, a friend of Mr Coles, said in a statement read out in court that he would have "run the other way" to avoid any trouble.

Another Swansea fan Alan Roberts told how they were spat at and were the target of missiles hurled by opposing fans which led to retaliatory stone-throwing outside Rotherham's Millmoor ground.

"It was totally out of control and lots of people didn't want to get involved," he said.

Soon after he was to witness Mr Coles being trampled by the police horse.

"There was no way it was going to stop in time," he said then describing how it hit with a "terrific force", knocking Mr Coles off his feet.

On Tuesday, retired Pc David Lindsay told the inquest he was trying to prevent Swansea fans throwing stones into the football ground at the time his horse collided with Mr Coles, a father-of-two from Morriston in Swansea.

Rejecting the opinion of one witness that he was not in control of his horse at the time, he recalled how other football fans had got out of his horse's way when he rode in a steady canter along the lane next to the ground to the ground.

But, he said, Mr Coles, a drayman for Bass breweries, had moved in front of this path and bent down.

Mr Lindsay maintained he could not have stopped his horse, called Fulwood, without "causing mayhem".

"My intention was to save an awful lot of injury to people in and around the ground," he said.

"I still believe to this day that it was the right thing to do."