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'There existed a hard core of people associated with this club whose sole purpose was violence for violence's sake'
In the words of the senior cop who brought them to justice they were 'intent on only one thing - violence'.
During the mid-to-late 80s Manchester City's Guvnors and Young Guvnors were making a name for themselves as two of most notorious hooligan firms in the country. With City languishing in the old Second Division the closely-connected mobs wreaked havoc on the terraces of English football.
But, their burgeoning notoriety also brought them to the attention of the authorities. In the wake of the European ban that followed the Heysel disaster and the infamous riots at Kenilworth Road and St Andrew's, and before the advent of the Premier League and Sky Sports millions, English football was at a crossroads.
Amid pressure from parliament to clamp down on the so-called 'English disease' police forces across the country set up dedicated operations to target their local firms. Between 1986 and 1988 Chelsea, Birmingham City, West Ham, Millwall, Crystal Palace, Leeds, Luton and Wolverhampton Wanderers were all subject to the close attentions of the law, with varying degrees of success.
Operation Omega was Greater Manchester Police's solution to the region's hooligan problem. Set up in 1987 and based at Hornby Lodge, the old Prestwich police station on Bury New Road, it was a small and ultra secretive unit of undercover cops whose mission was to infiltrate the crews causing mayhem.
The officers included Garry Rodgers, who wrote about his introduction to Omega in his book Undercover Policing.
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"So ground-breaking was this new police department that Harry's [the detective inspector in charge of the unit] chain of command took him straight up to Assistant Chief Constable Malcolm George, with no-one in between. At the time, hooliganism was a serious problem and GMP knew they had to do something about it.
"You don't just set up an elite undercover unit, taking officers out of other teams to work on it, with all the funding, man hours and equipment they need, without good reason."
The unit's first target was to be the Guvnors and Young Guvnors. And they didn't waste any time in turning up the heat.
"I realised the Old Bill were on to us about six months before we were arrested," wrote Mickey Francis, in his book Guvnors: The Autobiography of a Football Hooligan Gang Leader. "There was a lot of pretty obvious police observation: cops pointing cameras at us, mysterious geezers standing in the crowd with earpieces in, or sitting in the seats, pretending they were thugs, wearing brand new City shirts.
"The real boys only wore little badges. Then there was the guy no-one knew who approached us and said, 'Do you want to go for a ruckie?' What’s a ruckie?"
The surveillance was backed up by some daring undercover work. It later emerged one cop posing as a hooligan even drove some of the lads to games in his van. And after six months of hard and dangerous policing GMP's efforts bore fruit.
'Gang-bust police hold 21 City fans', read the front page headline on the Manchester Evening News on February 11, 1988.
It came after police launched a series of dawn raids on more than 100 homes in Manchester, Bury, Denton, Oldham and other towns in the north west. Some 21 people were arrested in the swoop, with flick knives, body armour and coshes seized.
Chief Supt Eric Tushingham, described as a 'veteran of crowd control at Maine Road', told the paper: "We have had few problems at City in recent seasons but a small minority have seemed bent on spoiling the atmosphere. This operation was all about weeding them out."
But the problems didn't stop there. Shortly after the arrests, in what became known as the 'Battle of Piccadilly', a British Transport Police officer suffered a fractured skull at Piccadilly station as he tried to stop a crew of Young Guvnors attacking United fans returning from an Arsenal match.
Then in May 1988, United and City fans clashed in the street outside Old Trafford ahead of a testimonial for long-serving full-back Arthur Albiston. With police filming the violence, one young man was punched and stamped on as he lay on the floor.
On April 24, 1989, a total of 26 alleged hooligans rounded up during Operation Omega appeared before Liverpool Crown Court. Twenty one pleaded guilty, but five denied charges of conspiracy to riot and causing violent disorder and were put on trial.
Opening the case David Sumner, prosecuting, said: "There existed a hard core of people associated with this club whose sole purpose was violence for violence's sake – recreational violence. If they were meeting another particularly notorious group like Leeds it would attract them to a near organisational frenzy.
"They would put other members under maximum pressure to attend the games and swell their numbers. Their purpose was to attack, intimidate and terrorise."
The court heard how a small group of undercover detectives infiltrated the gangs by donning disguises and writing up their notes at safe houses after each match. One young thug even kept a diary of his escapades in which he admitted being involved in violence at 24 matches, including an England versus Holland game at Wembley.
Writing about a clash with Oldham Athletic fans in the Arndale centre in Manchester, the 17-year-old said: "Ordinary people were standing about near the cashpoint machine and then suddenly out of the blue there were a cry 'war, war' and "Goveners, Goveners' and then we all started running into each other rowing for about two minutes non stop until police came and spoiled it for us.
"I jump into the cue of people watching on in horror and amusement that no police were in sight until it had all finished. I was stood behind a boy and his parents. The boy aged about six years who was crying. He had received a punch off somebody and when I heard about this I felt sorry about it but I didn't let on I was one of those vicious soccer thugs."
Prosecutors described the firms as being run 'like businesses' and being 'marshalled like an army'. Mickey Francis had a different take on it though. He was described in court as the firm's 'general' but scathingly dismissed the military comparisons.
"It was put over as though we were a huge, highly-organised army with everyone doing exactly as they were directed," he wrote. "All the stuff they raked up about us having generals and lieutenants and intelligence units was a load of b*******.
"You just go to the match with your boys and if it kicks, it kicks. Rarely is anyone badly hurt."
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The jury saw it differently though. After a four month trial all bar one of the 26 men and boys were convicted of violent disorder. Seven were jailed and football bans totalling 75 years were dished out.
After similar cases against Chelsea, West Ham and Millwall hooligans had collapsed the previous year due to unsafe police evidence, it was a major result for GMP.
'How Guvnors were smashed', read the Manchester Evening News headline the following day.
Chief Supt Frank Halligan, who organised the operation, told the paper: "I am confident that at Manchester City we have removed the hard core of troublemakers. These people were highly organised and intent on only one thing - violence."
It was the first, but not the last, big win for Operation Omega. Buoyed by its success in bringing down the Guvnors, the undercover began branching out.
Hooligans from Manchester United and Bolton were its next targets, before officers were then seconded to the 1990 World Cup in Italy to infiltrate England's then notorious trouble-makers. Omega's success in football prompted GMP to rethink its approach to undercover work and it became the Covert Operations Department.
Using the techniques officers had honed on football hooligans, its remit was expanded to take in drug dealers, robbery teams and even murderers.
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