Matchday ban for football thugs after city centre brawl
POLICE ID CITY AND UNITED FANS INVOLVED AFTER VIDEO IS PUBLISHED BY M.E.N.
FOOTBALL thugs who were part of a derby day brawl in the Northern Quarter have been handed matchday bans after police identified them from footage published by the M.E.N.
Witnesses filmed the clash between United and City fans on September 10, who started fighting after crossing paths at Hilton Street at 6.10pm.
Football intelligence officers examined the footage published on the M.E.N. website, and identified four United fans in the thick of the violence.
Among the mob was Jay Cornforth, 21, an amateur boxer of Ashton Old Road, Beswick who had been sentenced days earlier for branding Liverpool fans ‘murderers’ in a banner unfurled on the M602. His brother Conor Cornforth, 25, of Ashton Old Road, Beswick, and two other men, Liam Worthington, 28, of Assheton Crescent, Newton Heath, and Michael Hughes, 26, of Bollington Road, Miles Platting were also traced. Now all four men have been given three-year football banning orders after admitting affray at Manchester Crown Court. The sentencing hearing was told that plastic trays, crates, tables and chairs were hurled as up to 30 men ran at each other in the street for three minutes. Jay Cornforth could be seen adopting a fighter’s stance and bouncing on his toes in the fracas. His barrister, David Morton, told the court he was ‘extremely remorseful.’ “He works hard towards his Jay Cornforth’s barrister David Morton ambition to become a professional boxer. He had not been to the match in question and was going with his friends to watch a boxing match in the Northern Quarter when he happened upon the incident and joined in. He didn’t intend all of this, but accepts he readily joined in,” Mr Morton added.
Defending Conor Cornforth as well, Mr Morton described him as ‘full of shame’ for his part in a ‘despicable piece of public disorder.’
A fourth defendant, Michael Hughes, was subject to a football banning order at the time.
His barrister, Waheed Baber, claimed this was merely because of ‘rowdy’ and ‘vocal’ behaviour at matches, and not because of ‘football-related crime.’
“He only became involved once he was thrown to the ground by a member of the opposition”, Mr Baber said.
Mike Brady, defending Worthington, said the fight was ‘not organised football violence of the type which these courts and society was depressingly familiar in years gone by,’ but a ‘spontaneous event provoked by words exchanged.’
“Importantly, no spectators were hurt and the only persons injured were volunteers in this violence,” Mr Brady added.
Ordering each man to serve a 12-month community order, with 160 hours unpaid work, and restricting their movements on matchdays with three-year banning orders, Recorder Paul Reid QC described the incident as a ‘very unpleasant piece of violence.’