The voice on the line from Talence in Bordeaux belongs to a tragic figure but the message from Max Brito is patient and clear: Accidents happen in rugby and other sports and everywhere in life. If we stop playing sport for fear of injury you might as well stop doing anything.

Twenty five years ago on 3 June 1995 Brito broke his neck playing for Cote dIvoire in their one and only World Cup finals, held in South Africa. In the second minute of the teams third pool match against Tonga in Rustenburg, Brito a quick and nimble wing who was in the squad only because of an injury to his older brother Patrick caught a box-kick from a scrum and ran towards the Tongan forwards.

He was tackled to the ground and as he tried to lay the ball back, players of both sides fell on him, forcing a blast of huge pressure through his head and neck. He is said to have called to Jean Sathicq, the Cote dIvoire captain: Its over.

It was and remains the most shocking injury at a major rugby tournament. Britos spinal cord was severed at the fifth vertebra, and he was left in a wheelchair for life, unable to walk, though today he can tap his fingers and has about half the normal range of movement in his arms. I am very limited in what I can do, Brito tells i, speaking through an interpreter. All the same, I manage to move about the house, to do certain things. I dont have a job but I read about naturopathy [healing through natural therapies], and that takes up my time.

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Britos father Charles, from Senegal, passed away last year, but he sees his mother Yolande, who was from Cote dIvoire, every so often, 70km away in Biscarrosse. Not so his two sons. I live by myself, Brito says, I had a friend but we are no longer together. It is not straightforward with the nurses and home help, etc. I have help every day.

It was the Biscarrosse Olympique club in Frances fourth division that Brito was playing for when he was picked for the World Cup. During an hours conversation the phrase laccident occurs a lot, as he describes the long struggle to overcome what befell him. I would say there were 13 or 14 years of fog where I didnt know where I was. The accident was very violent. But after that I had a spiritual enlightenment and I understood that it was necessary to accept my handicap. And from that moment on, all the doors were open.

In the second pool match, Brito had faced France, the adopted country of his parents, and little Cote dIvoire put two tries past the eventual semi-finalists. His opposite number was Philippe Saint-Andre, a great of the game. Its a fairy tale to play at the World Cup, says Brito, who was an electrician at the time.

You dont even think it could happen, but to get there all of a sudden, it was extraordinary. They remain happy memories up to a point, of course. I wanted to know what happened, so I watched it. Once youve accepted what happened, its easier to watch it back.

He watched last years World Cup on TV and only declined an invitation from World Rugby to go to Japan due to a misunderstanding over his wheelchair on the flights. Overall there appears to be no bitterness towards the sport that changed his life.

I was in the wrong place at the wrong time and the accident happened, Brito says. If you look at the game as a whole, there are injuries sprains, pulled muscles etc but there are not very many violent accidents like mine.

I think rugby is very physical. Players are much more musclebound nowadays; that has changed the game. But we cant stop the game because it is dangerous. I think young people should play the sport that most interests them. You are not protected from injury whether you play football or rugby or whatever.

The Cote dIvoire rugby union has recently announced the Max Brito Academy, a fund in the west African country to train hundreds of young players while providing medical provision and teaching them a trade. Its the start of a great sporting adventure, Brito says. Its been four years of waiting after rugby in the country slowed down.

His own financial status is more delicate. There was an initial insurance payout, but he says people mistakenly believe he is receiving money from Frances Albert Ferrasse Foundation. I didnt have the right because I was playing for Cote dIvoire. In 1995, Marcel Martin [the late French director of Rugby World Cup] told me I would have help, but over time that has diminished. I just about get by now.

Brito has always been erroneously stated as 24 years old at the time of the injury. He was in fact 27, and he is now 52. He has a shaven head and says of the dreadlocks he wore that fateful day in Rustenburg: They annoyed me a lot once I had had my accident. And his greatest pleasures are reading and following the news.

Willie Lose was a flanker for Tonga facing Cote dIvoire in the 1995 World Cup match when Max Brito was injured.

Speaking from his home in Auckland, New Zealand, Lose told i: Its hard to believe it was a quarter of a century ago as it still seems like yesterday.

It was a beautiful day in Rustenburg and we as a squad were desperate to finish third in our pool in our final match.

It felt like we had just kicked off when the fateful accident occurred.

We kicked for position and the left winger Max Brito collected the ball and looked to return possession. I was the second player to arrive at the contact area and we held Max up he wasnt a big guy for what felt like a few seconds, looking to turn his body and ball to be on our side of the maul. Other forwards arrived simultaneously and it soon became a ruck. This happens in a rugby game perhaps close to a hundred times and Ive replayed it over and over, thinking why this time?

The only sound I recall was of someone exhaling due to the weight of the players on top. We all immediately untangled ourselves and it still wasnt clear, the severity of the injury. Ive played rugby all my life and seen twisted ankles, knees and other broken bones and the pain from the players is deafening. Sadly for Max it was a silent killer.

On the greatest rugby stage in a players career, the World Cup, it was a moment Ill never forget.

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Rugby World Cup injury left me in a wheelchair but I wouldnt discourage anyone from playing the game - iNews