Leigh Francis reveals horrifyingly huge gash on face caused by fan’s fingernail

Celebrity Juice host Leigh Francis shared the awful facial injury given to him by an over-excited fan’s massive fingernail.

The comedian, 53 – best known for his alter ego Keith Lemon – is also a regular on the DJ scene, which comes with its own set of perils, as he recently discovered.

While spinning discs at Sound Bites festival in Syon Park, his sick tunes clearly got the crowd going, leading to a nasty wound in the most unexpected way.

He took to social media to explain what happened, and show the damage.

‘Oh, hello. I’ve just got back to my room, been DJing. Went into the crowd, and someone was overcome with joy, so that was a nice feeling.

‘So she went: “I love you!” and put her hands towards my face and her thumbnail, which was quite long… did that,’ he said.

He then dramatically turned his head to show an angry, red gash from his hair all the way to his eye, luckily just missing the tender organ by millimetres.

With a note of shock in his voice, he noted: ‘Could’ve been worse, could’ve gone in my eye but yeah bit of a naughty one that, innit?’

And in the caption added: ‘I guess I’ve gotta stop going into the crowd. Gonna have to put a bit of vinegar on pet. Stinger!’

His plight raked in a flurry of sympathy from horrified friends and fans.

Friend Stephen Paulson commented on Instagram: ‘Blimey! Even I didn’t do that with you and I had Wolverine claws! Heal fast mate!’

‘Jesus, what was she, Edwina Scissor Hands?’ Jason Penny Cooke joked.

‘Omg Leigh that’s awful,’ Dolls wrote on TikTok.

‘Jeeez! Pal, I hope you’re ok,’ P21cey echoed. ‘Ouch! I’m glad you are OK!’ AndreaR said.

The TV personality then did a follow-up video as another of his alter egos, Avid Merrion, in which he filmed a day in his life for the second day of the festival, with a heavy emphasis on his ‘war wound’.

At one point, he jokingly shows a woman and declared: ‘This is the lady that clawed my face with overexcitement.’

Recounting the incident, he said ‘all the joy left [his] body’ and advised festival attendees not to get ‘too drunk’ when they are having a good time.

Although he quipped he looked like a ‘sexy action man’ and that next time he would perform as another of his characters, The Bear, who no one would dare mess with.

Leigh has been concentrating on his live comedy and music career in recent years and, despite the physical dangers, seems committed to this path for the forseeable future.

In September, he revealed he ‘doesn’t know’ if he’ll ever return to the world of TV after ITV cancelled Celebrity Juice in 2022.

He said: ‘Juice will never come back… someone asked me when I’m back on TV and I said I don’t know.

‘I did say it’s pretty difficult doing things these days without offending people.’

Adding that he had got ideas, he caveated: ‘I don’t think comedy is commissioned as easily as back in the day.’

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