Former Kent captain David Fulton has released video footage of the accident that left his career in tatters in a bid to raise awareness of improved personal accident insurance cover for cricketers.

An 80-second clip of the accident which happened in the St Lawrence practice nets in Canterbury on April 11, 2003, has been posted on the website of the Professional Cricketers’ Association to show players how easily and quickly a career-threatening injury can happen.

Having been named PCA player of the season and a Wisden Player of the Year in 2001, Fulton enjoyed a successful 2002 and, at the peak of his game, was been touted for England Test selection when the freak accident occurred.

The shocking video shows Fulton being hit on the right-side of his batting helmet by a hard, plastic training ball accidentally fired out of the bowling machine at 90mph.

***Click here to see the video on the Professional Cricketers’ Association's website ***

Fulton was left nursing a torn tear duct and remains partially sighted in his right eye. Although he fought back to play a further 18 months and reach 200 first-class appearances, Fulton never batted with the fluency and panache he possessed prior to the incident.

Explaining his reasons behind releasing the video five years later, Fulton said: "I know the video has a certain ‘YouTube’ quality about it but I wasn’t looking for sympathy or coverage for myself, I simply wanted players to know an accident like this can happen at any time and, that after my accident, I was never the same player again.

"The PCA have good insurance but I’d ask all young players to consider talking out extra units of coverage.

"And, should the worst happen, they might end up with £120,000 rather than £60,000.

"It was a freakish injury in a sense, had I kept looking down for an instant longer the ball might have missed me but I just started to turn around at the instant the ball was fired out of the machine.

"I didn’t see the ball coming at any stage and only knew afterwards from watching the video that it was an orange ball."