FOOTBALLER turned movie star Vinnie Jones and his wife Tanya visited Harefield Hospital on Tuesday to lend their support to the fight against its closure.

Tanya's life was saved by a recent heart transplant operation at the hospital and she and Vinnie decided to lend their support to the Heart of Harefield campaign as an act of gratitude.

Despite this sudden injection of star-power, the campaign may be in its final stages, as last week legal advisers warned the group that it would be unwise to take the matter to court.

Jean Brett, Heart of Harefield chairwoman, said: "We are thrilled to bits with the visit as publicity is oxygen for our campaign and Tanya sitting here is a living advertisement to the good work Harefield surgeons do every day. We just need a thousand Vinnies to tell the authorities to keep their hands off the centre."

Campaigners reluctantly agreed at a meeting on Wednesday last week that the cost of seeking a judicial review to save the specialist heart transplant centre, which is at the centre of a fiercely-contested merger proposal with St Mary's in Paddington, would be too high.

Mrs Brett said: "Being mindful of the huge cost and following lengthy legal advice we have decided it would be wiser to reconsider taking a judicial review until we have further information. But we will continue to fight the campaign as we feel the plan to close Harefield is illogical, hare-brained and ridiculous."

The protesters believe the health authorities cannot meet the conditions to provide necessary support to those patients who would be forced to travel to the new £360m Paddington heart transplant centre which is due to be built in 2007.

Outline plans have been laid out to provide accommodation to support relatives and guaranteed parking spaces in the complex. But campaigners believe that patients could find it difficult to travel to the centre because of heavy traffic in Paddington and extensive building work could delay the opening of the complex.

"We doubt very much they can meet their own conditions so we will have a much more straight-forward case if we choose to contend the merger decision in court," Mrs Brett added.

Alongside the legal fight the group is still pushing to persuade Secretary of State for Health, Alan Milburn to keep the centre at Harefield.