Recycling worker Michael Daly told a jury he didn't rob a store and said the real robber must have worn one of his old hats.

Daly, who salvaged wood and metal on the Cabot Circus shopping centre development, said he frequently discarded woolly hats which he wore under his construction helmet.

He conceded his DNA was detected on a hat said to have been used by a masked raider – but said he didn't commit an armed raid on the Co-op in Brislington.

A shop supervisor was shot in the back during the raid and had a handgun held to her face before two robbers stole £400 from the safe.

Daly, 44, of All Hallows Road, Easton, denies robbery and having a firearm, a silver gas-powered air pistol, with intent on November 30 last year.

Shop supervisor Justine Weaving told Bristol Crown Court she was taking out two bags of rubbish from the rear of the Co-op, in Broomhill Road, when two masked men pounced – one of them brandishing a gun.

After turning back into a staff room she felt the shot hit her upper left shoulder, and was grabbed around the throat before one of the men plundered the cash and they fled.

Ms Weaving said neither man wore glasses, but she noticed one had very grey eyebrows.

The jury heard retired Brian Sheppard later found a discarded holdall, containing a silver handgun, knife, sealed bag of coins and a purse, on a path between nearby Manworthy Road and Allison Road.

He took the gun, knife and coins home, before reporting the find to police.

Police then investigated the dumped holdall, found a woolly hat and detected Daly's DNA on it.

A second man said to be involved was not identified.

Daly said he didn't know where he was on the evening in question.

He told the jury: "I haven't been to the store. I was not there on November 30. I didn't rob Justine Weaver."

He explained how he often threw woolly hats away because washing them made them go out of shape "like Coco the Clown's trousers".

Daly said that when construction work finished on Cabot Circus he and his colleagues were laid off, but he found other work on a cash-in-hand basis.

He denied cutting holes in a woolly hat, to make an improvised balaclava, and stressed that he wore glasses because he was "blind as a bat" without them.

He said the only reason he made "no comment" replies to police in interview was because he was following legal advice.

Gemma Peters, an optometrist for Specsavers opticians, confirmed Daly needed glasses all the time and would only see outlines without them.

The case continues.