Ed Sheeran's doctor said he might never play guitar again

Ed Sheeran says his doctor warned him that he might never play guitar again after he broke both arms in a biking accident.

The superstar singer was appearing on British TV chat king Jonathan Ross’ Saturday night show when he made the shocking revelation.

Sheeran had to cancel his Asian tour after being involved in a road accident which left him with a broken rib, wrist and elbow.

He told Ross: “I tried to say I’ll carry on doing the shows but they said if I put any more stress on it, I might not be able to play [guitar] again so it’s good to be sensible. They are saying four weeks and then we’ll look at it.

“I broke my wrist, my elbow and my rib. I came off a bike quite fast, a bicycle, a pedal bike. I was in Suffolk [going down a really steep hill].”

“The thing is, when it happened, I got up and was like, ‘That hurt’ and then cycled to the pub. Went home, went to sleep and then woke up at five o’clock in the morning in a lot of pain. And then went to the hospital.”

Sheeran admitted that things could have been much worse as he wasn’t wearing a cycle helmet or pads. He also said that it isn’t the first time his clumsiness has caused him an injury.

He said: “I remember before a show in 2013 I had to have 12 stitches in my hand because I was playing drums with two beer bottles at about four o’clock in the morning and smashed my hand.

“But I did a show after that and, it wasn’t fine, but I did a show. Then I put my foot in a boiling geyser in Iceland, I had my face cut open, I’m a very clumsy person.”

The interview took a darker turn as Sheeran admitted to falling into substance abuse during a period where he wasn’t touring or recording.

He told Ross: “I just focused on other things. I focused on work and I can’t work under the influence, I can’t write songs under the influence, I can’t perform under the influence so the more I worked the less [that happened].

“It just started gradually happening and then some people took me to one side and were like, ‘Calm yourself down’… It’s all fun to begin with, it all starts off as a party and then you’re doing it on your own and it’s not so that was a wake up call and taking a year off.”