'I had 400 fights as West Ham hooligan – this fanbase was the toughest I faced'

A fan has recalled his time as a football hooligan where he had over 400 fights with rivals.

Bill Gardner, now 70, was one of the most feared hooligans in West Ham's Inter City Firm during the 1970s and 1980s – when sickening football violence was at its peak.

, who recently interviewed him for Gangster Presents series Hooligans, described him as "huge" and a "man mountain".

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Giving an insight into what football was like back then, Bill said: “Away supporters used to be attacked nearly everywhere in this country. Some places worse than others.

“Sometimes we (West Ham's Inter City Firm) did well, other times we didn’t do so well, but they know, everyone knows, that they never done us. And nobody done me.

“I think I’ve had over 400 fights in my life, and I never got beaten. I’ve never had the fear that normal human beings have. I was never frightened when I was with my mates at .

“They all knew they could rely on me, and I would never leave them alone. If one of them went down, I would pick him up, and I would still do it today. They became my family and it was a family I never had.”

This comment goes all the way back to his violent childhood. He told Tony that he had a sister who died of leukaemia aged just four. His mum and dad “took it really badly” and Bill’s younger years were plagued by bullying and abuse.

He said his mother would hit him with “whatever she could get her hands on” including lumps of wood, rubber and plastic.

As for the scariest experience, he recalled: “One night she was having a really bad turn and she started coming through the door with a bread knife like a scene from The Shining. My dad was crying, he said, ‘You've got to go now Bill, she’s going to kill you.’”

Getting older, he felt like he wasn’t wanted, until he first stepped onto the terraces at Upton Park, where he eventually became a “legend” with fellow fans.

He articulated how it was his home and it finally felt like he was part of a family, and he went on to be known as the “top boy” or “Mr West Ham”.

However, he would not refer to himself as a hooligan, and he explained why: ”I saw myself as a person that loved football, loved West Ham, wanted to go with my friends, and I would go and if they was attacked, or if we was attacked, I would do my best to help.

“Never a hooligan, a hooligan is someone who smashes things up and breaks things, I never done that. If someone wanted to fight me – I would fight them.”

And despite claiming to have always come out on top in physical encounters, there was one other group of supporters that earned his respect, and it is a surprising one.

Back in 2021, he spoke on the Anything Goes podcast where he revealed his admiration for West Ham’s arch rivals Millwall.

He described being in a 600-man brawl and said: “I think Millwall [were the toughest] when I think of some of those games we played.

“More than 300 on each side, you know what I mean, when we went over there they used to all turn out and I’ve got nothing but respect for them, I think they are all alright.”

As for the tactics he would employ in such a crowded melee, he continued: “It’s just a free for all really, like they say in the film Zulu ‘mark your target’ when they come, you know what I mean. You know the one you are going to have.

“I used to always go for the one at the front who was the mouthy one. I used to go for that one because I believed that you cut the tree at the bottom, the tree will fall.”

Police eventually had a huge crack down on hooliganism and Bill decided to stop getting into fights after being arrested in 1987. He said he was either going to end up dead or mad – so he chose the latter.