basketball star Charles Barkley.

Mr. Edward Durham, six foot two and 210 pounds, says he floored the six foot six, 252 pound NBA player in a nightclub.

The 36-year-old Bermudian alleges Barkley punched him in the mouth after he objected to the player insulting a woman.

Barkley has denied hitting out.

But Mr. Durham is now a celebrity in Phoenix, Arizona, where he lives with his American wife and two daughters. He has appeared on network TV and in the national paper USA Today.

TV crews have been camping outside his house and a local radio station has even fixed up another meeting of the two men.

It all started in the early hours of last Thursday when Mr. Durham was enjoying '70s and '80s sounds in Stixx, a yuppie bar in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Mr. Durham, a fan of Barkley and his Phoenix Suns team, was hoping to get an autograph.

"Apparently this young lady was telling him how she felt and whispering in his ear,'' Mr. Durham told The Royal Gazette yesterday.

"She apparently said something he didn't like, and he said he would kick her in the face.

"I just said: `Mr. Barkley, you should not talk like that in public', thinking everybody was going to be down on him.

"He told me to kiss where the sun don't shine and I told him where to go. We had a few words and I thought it was finished.

"He was about 25 feet from me and I was getting ready to leave.'' "He gave me the finger and I told him where to go and he told me where to go.

"He came running over to get at me and took a swing and struck me. "Using his momentum I just tripped him up and he fell to the ground.

"By then the tempers were flaring. I was standing over him and all the bouncers came and pulled me away.

"I couldn't understand why he just flipped like that. It was just like watching him on the basketball court when he gets out of hand.

"If he keeps acting that way somebody's not going to be as restrained as I was.

"I could have easily stood on his fingers. In a fight anything can happen and he's worth all that money.'' Mr. Durham, who ended up with a cut lip, pressed charges. But now he wants "to let bygones be bygones'' and has dropped them.

"I think he learnt his lesson. Between me and him, he knows he was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

"I guess I was the first one to put him on the ground.'' Mr. Durham says he admires Barkley because he plays basketball the way his father, Mr. Edward Durham of Smith's Parish, used to play first division soccer for PHC.

He even shaves his head like the All-Star power forward.

But his Bermudian sense of decency forced him to speak out in the nightclub.

"In Bermuda, star or no star, everybody gets the same treatment.

"We know how to get along -- tourism is our trade.

"But we're not going to stand there and take everybody's ignorance.

"There's a lot of places he frequents that I go.

"I'll let him know what he did was wrong. I think he'll control his temper because next time I won't wait.'' The two men may meet on December 10 at a music show, where a radio station hopes to stage a meeting. Mr. Durham hopes he will finally get that autograph.

In the meantime his fame is rivalling that of the NBA's current MVP.

"I went out on Saturday night and people came asking me for my autograph.

People called me up and offered me jobs as a bouncer.'' Mr. Durham, a vitamin salesman for a health company, has lived in the United States for 11 years.

He plans to visit the Island on May 24 to take part in the Heritage Day cycle race.

The basketball star has denied throwing a punch. He said he gave the woman his autograph and then she insulted him.

Scottsdale Police Lt. Mike Keeley said Police talked to two of Barkley's friends who were with him at Stixx and seven other people who were in the bar at the time. All supported the version that Barkley gave, he said.

He said the local prosecutor's office would make a decision about whether to charge anyone this morning.

CHARLES BARKLEY -- floored by Bermudian Edward Durham in a Phoenix nightclub.