Terrified drinkers cowered in a club's cellar fearing they would be burned alive as rioters launched a ferocious petrol-bomb assault on their building.

Bradford Crown Court heard how members of Manningham Ward Labour Club - including a 78-year-old woman and her disabled son - used beer barrels to barricade themselves inside the building during the height of the Bradford riots nearly two years ago.

Club steward Roy Glister even phoned police to say they had only five minutes to live as a barrage of missiles and petrol bombs rained down on the club at the junction of Toller Lane and Whetley Lane, the court heard.

Mohammed Ilyas, 48, of Prospect Road, Wapping, Bradford, has pleaded not guilty to a charge of arson with intent to endanger the lives of all 23 people inside the club and an alternative charge of arson being reckless as to whether their lives would be endangered.

Some of the drinkers were physically sick as the building burned around them, prosecutor Alistair MacDonald QC told the court.

He told how their terrifying ordeal began after a quiet night at the club when it became clear that the rioters were heading their way at the height of the troubles on July 7, 2001.

The doors to the club were bolted and Mr Glister ordered everyone to gather in the lounge, but as masked rioters began hurling missiles and petrol bombs at the premises some people began to panic.

"A number of people wanted to leave the club for obvious reasons... but they were prevented from doing so by Mr Glister who said it was unsafe for them to go outside," Mr MacDonald told the city's crown court. Mr Glister took 20 people into the cellar area for safety and beer barrels were used to barricade the doors.

"By this stage the people in the cellar were petrified," Mr MacDonald told the city's crown court yesterday. "They formed the view they were going to die either by being burned alive in the cellar or by people getting into the club."

Among those trapped in the cellar was a 78-year-old woman and her severely disabled son and Mr MacDonald told the jury: "Many of the ladies in the cellar were in tears and some people were being physically sick. 'They thought they were in severe peril of being burned alive."

A couple who had not made it to the cellar area took shelter in a gents toilet as the club was attacked and Mr MacDonald said the content of a phone call to their family clearly showed the depth of their distress.

He said it was only by chance that a break in the line of rioters allowed the police and fire crews through to rescue the 23 people who had been trapped inside the club.

But because the hard-pressed fire crews had to deal with another blaze at a nearby pub, Mr Glister and his family could only watch as their club and home collapsed.

The attack left the building a "smoking ruin" and caused damage estimated at more than £1 million.

Mr MacDonald said it was not alleged that Ilyas alone had caused the fire or that he had thrown any petrol bombs into the premises, but he told the jury they would see video footage showing him trying to set light to curtains at the club when he must have known there were people inside.

Film from the club's own CCTV equipment is also said to show Ilyas returning to the premises and pushing burning material through a window.

It is part of the crown's case that on the night of the riot Ilyas was out on the streets wearing a curly Afro-style wig and Mr MacDonald indicated that an issue in the case would be whether the person in those photographs was in fact the defendant.

The trial is expected to last until late June.