Shrews' keeper saved from serious injury

The Shrewsbury Town goalkeeper narrowly escaped serious injury after an explosive device was thrown within feet of him during the club’s fourth round FA Cup tie against Chelsea, British police said today.

Ian Dunbavin was lucky not to have been seriously injured after the four-inch-long metal tube was thrown onto the pitch from outside the ground, West Mercia Police said.

A force spokesman told BBC's Radio Five Live: “It’s a wicked looking bit of metal...It’s exploded.

“If it had exploded anywhere near the goalie or indeed anywhere [else] in a ground that’s packed with 8,000 people very serious injury or worse could have occurred.

“I just think it’s sheer lunacy.”

Police experts will be brought in to examine the missile to work out what it is.