POLICE have warned two gipsies they will be arrested if they take part in a televised bare-knuckle brawl at this year’s Appleby Horse Fair.

Channel 4’s My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding star Paddy Doherty has boasted in the national press he and fellow traveller Johnny Joyce will battle it out to “their last breath” in front of a 10,000-strong crowd at the June event.

The 52-year-old from Salford has reportedly promised to avenge an earlier scrap with Mr Joyce, which he said left him with a smashed jaw.

It is claimed they will fight for a £50,000 prize.

But, amid fears the brawl could attract thousands of unwanted spectators to the fair, Cumbria Police has warned the pair they risk arrest if they take part in an illegal fight.

“This fight would contravene many regulations,” said John Chambers, Eden community sergeant and police planning officer for Appleby Fair.

“It is without the governance of a boxing federation and it would also be classed as some sort of breach of public order.

"Anyone engaging in criminal activity can expect to be arrested.”

The ancient gipsy sport of bare-knuckle boxing has been traditionally used to settle family quarrels and as a show of masculinity.

But a bare-knuckle fight for cash is classed as an unregulated prize fight by police and is therefore against the law.

Mr Chambers said police also had the full support of the gipsy and traveller fraternity in preventing the Doherty-Joyce fight going ahead.

‘King of the Gipsies’ Billy Welsh, who sat on the multi-agency strategic co-ordinating group for Appleby Fair, said the fight was nothing more than boastful talk.

“Neither the gipsy and traveller community nor the police will put up with such nonesense,” he said.

“Those two men live three miles apart on caravan sites in Salford.

"Why not just have the fight there? It’s a lot of bravado for the papers.”

He added the television series My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding had created a scramble for fame among the traveller community.

“Everyone’s wanting to be in that show, have their wedding filmed or their family on the TV.

"The fight is just another way of getting publicity.

"There are laws in this land and that fight is against the law and we won’t stand for anything like it,” he said.

PC Chambers added that anyone who had concerns about the fight or the policing of this year’s event could get in touch with the police through their parish council.