Six of the group were arrested after youths stole a crate of Stella Artois from a boater celebrating his birthday, threw beer bottles which broke windows and cut a passer-by's foot, assaulted a police officer and damaged her car.

Sgt Richard Line, from Middlewich CAT team, said: "We believe they had come in for a pre-arranged fight with local youths following an allegation that someone from Middlewich had assaulted a Winsford teenager.

"Some of the group were carrying golf clubs."

The gang gathered near Somerfield supermarket before heading to the Trent and Mersey Canal and starting an argument with people outside the Big Lock pub, where much of the trouble happened.

A witness inside the pub, who did not wish to be named, said: "It was quite bad and quite scary because there were a lot of them - if they had tried to get in the pub there would have been no chance of stopping them."

One of the Winsford gang spat at the female police officer who attended to tackle them at the Big Lock while others attacked her car before running into the town centre where six boys aged between 14 and 18 were later arrested.

They have since been bailed while more enquiries are carried out.

Sgt Line added: "In this case there were no serious assaults and not too much damage, but we intend to make sure this situation does not escalate.

"CCTV can give us warning of any build up of groups of youths, bus companies will let us know if large groups are travelling into Middlewich and we are working closely with our colleagues in neighbouring towns to pick up any information about pending trouble."

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