Paul Gascoigne back in rehab for alcohol addiction

The former England midfielder checked into a £6,000-a-month clinic in Southhampton

Paul Gascoigne attends a match at his former club, Tottenham Hotspur (Getty Images)

Paul Gascoigne is undergoing an extensive rehabilitation programme as he continues to battle alcohol addiction.

The former England midfielder has checked into a £6,000-a-month clinic in Southampton, marking the seventh time the sportsman has entered a rehabilitation facility.

Sources close to Gascoigne, who apparently has over a week left on the programme, said that they hoped this treatment would be the last he will have to experience.

"We have been here so many times with Paul, but at least he is trying to get better," a friend apparently told The Mirror. "The fact he has gone into a clinic is encouraging.

"He has the love and support of so many people, but only he can sort his life out and get well again."

Last year, Gascoigne was flown out to a rehabilitation centre in the USA, after his former teammates and famous friends – including Gary Lineker and Piers Morgan – raised over £100,000 to put him on the prestigious Cottonwood clinic programme in Arizona.

It remains unclear how his current stint in the Southhampton clinic is being funded.

However, he reportedly started drinking again within weeks of returning to this home in Boscombe, near Bournemouth and was fined £1,000 for drunkly assaulting a railway worker within a matter of months.

Speaking during ITV documentary Being Paul Gascoigne, which was broadcast in September 2013, Gascoigne worried supporters by suggesting that he would be "better off dead".

Gasgoine: 'Please Don't Let Me Die, I Need To Water The Plants'

"At least I know if I did pass away through it I wouldn’t be in this pain all the time," he said.

"I just think sometimes, f***ing hell, just go away i.e. drink or me go away – and that means a wooden box and six nails."

"But I’ll keep on trying. And try my best till I actually can get this. I’ve been lucky twice," he continued.

"I hope I don’t die through it, because I won’t get any sympathy because, well, he was warned."

However, Gascoigne seemed in a far more positive frame of mind in December.

Taking to Twitter at the end of last year, he posted: