Popular Sunday league footballer ‘Izzy’ Mohammed may have been fatally stabbed because a drug dealer mistook him for a rival operating on his patch, a court heard on Wednesday.

Mr Mohammed, 24, died three weeks after being stabbed in the abdomen in the early hours of Monday, July 10 in Salt Hill Park, Slough. He was in the park celebrating the start of his 24th birthday.

Oladapo Obadare, 25, Ryan Fuller-Bent, 20, both of no fixed address, and Ricky Champion Musaba, 21, of Rolt Street, Lewisham have all pleaded not guilty to murdering him.

John Price, prosecuting, told Reading Crown Court that Mr Mohammed and four friends had been sitting on the skate ramp in the park drinking, and possibly taking drugs, when the three defendants had approached them ‘in a spirit of confrontation’.

He said: “The three thought that ‘Izzy’ Mohammed and his friends were rival drug dealers and chose to confront them as an act of enforcement to protect what they saw as their drug dealing territory.”

He said all three had been charged with murder because they had ‘acted together with a common purpose’ although it was Obadare who stabbed Mr Mohammed.

All three have also pleaded not guilty to a second charge of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm.

The court heard that another man who was at the scene ran away and was chased through the trees and flower beds of the park until he fell and was set upon.

He said: “By kicking out and struggling for all he was worth (he) was able to get up and run off.”

The man discovered he had been stabbed, but made a full recovery.

Mr Price said that Obadare had gone straight from the stabbing to keep an appointment he had made to sell drugs to a customer in an alleyway near Salt Hill Mansions, where had been living.

He told the jury: “Within minutes of the stabbing it was still business as usual for Mr Obadare.”

The jury was also told that all three defendants were seen at a party at the flat in Salt Hill Mansions where Obadare was living – and they had been admiring a flick knife which was being handed between them only two days before the fatal attack.

Mr Price said that Obadare had previous convictions for carrying knives and that the flat at Salt Hill Mansions had contained knives when it was searched as well as quantities of drugs which he had denied knowing about until his DNA was found all over them.

The trial could last as long as six weeks – with the defence teams putting their cases forward after Easter. Obedare also faces one charge of intimidating a witness while he was in jail, which he denies.