Club will receive an estimated $200,000 in damages.

Mr. Dennis Wilfred Morris died from injuries he suffered when he tumbled from the wall on the upper level of the Devonshire clubhouse.

He had been watching his son playing cricket when the accident happened. In Supreme Court, Nationals were cleared of any responsibility for the accident.

But Mr. Morris' widow, Mrs. Carole Morris, took the case to the Court of Appeal and their decision was revealed to The Royal Gazette yesterday.

The Appeal Judges decided that the club must accept 25 percent of the responsibility for the accident while Mr. Morris' own action would account for the rest.

The Hon. Harvey da Costa, President, said: "In this case, obvious as may have been the possibility of falling from the wall if one sat upon it, no-one appeared to have been aware of the possibility.

"The son of the deceased testified that people would sit on the wall every Sunday when the club was having a home game. Club officials would be present then.

"He said that he himself sat on the wall once or twice. People did it usually and he did not think it unusual.

"As the trial judge correctly concluded the failure of the deceased to realise the obvious risk simply meant that he was not taking reasonable care for his own safety.'' Mr. da Costa said that in the Occupiers and Highway Authorities Act 1987 it stated that the club should take steps to make sure visitors are reasonably safe when using the premises.

He said: "If management was aware, as plainly they were, that invitees were sitting on the wall and were conscious that it was a potentially dangerous thing to do, taking such care in the circumstances of the case would include taking steps to prevent use of the wall for sitting.

"It does not appear to me enough to say that the danger was obvious and that the visitor took the risk on his own. I would not myself think that that would have been the approach of the management of the club.

"Rather, like the deceased himself, the attitude would have been one of lack of appreciation of the potential danger correctly characterised when considering the actions of the deceased as typical negligence.

"Had they been aware of the danger, there would at least have been a warning.

The evidence was that erecting a railing along the length of wall would have cost $2,250 -- hardly a prohibitive cost.'' Mr. da Costa said that both the club and Mr. Morris were partly to blame for the accident.

He continued: "In allocating the percentage of negligence the heavier share must fall on the deceased. Many persons sat on the wall over a period of time without falling from it.

"It was clearly some action on his part which caused the loss of balance and the tragic fall.

"In the circumstances I would allocate responsibility for the accident between the parties in the following proportion -- to the deceased 75 percent and to the club 25 percent.'' He said that compensation should be based on that 25 percent of the total damages suffered. The club also must pay the cost of the appeal and half the costs of the trial.

Legal experts yesterday estimated the damages to be in the region of $200,000.