A Manchester United fan who attacked a fellow Red at last year's Champions League final has been banned from attending football matches.

Ian Potts, 41, pleaded guilty to assault at Manchester magistrates court and received a four-year banning order.

Potts, of Sanderson Close, Worsley, launched a violent attack on his 46-year-old victim inside Rome's Stadio Olimpico.

The victim had earlier intervened outside the ground when he spotted Potts rowing with a woman.

Potts threatened him and they went their separate ways.

But inside the stadium before the match started Potts spotted the man again and attacked him, leaving him with a serious injury to his ear.

Det Con Alex Robinson, from GMP's Football Intelligence Unit, welcomed the sentence, which will see Potts banned from grounds in England and Wales.

He said: "The victim had done absolutely nothing to warrant such a vicious attack and has been left permanently scarred by the assault.

"As any decent person would, he simply came to the aid of a woman who was being picked upon by this man outside the stadium but thought that was the end of the matter.

"Potts is clearly not a real supporter and football crowds will be that little bit better without him in them."

United lost the match, on May 27 last year, to Spanish giants Barcelona 2-0.

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