Swanny Gillen

When Les Battersby was facing an upcoming trial for assaulting PC Mick Hopwood (a charge of which, for once, he was totally innocent) he and Kirk Sutherland went round the Street asking various residents to act as a character witness. Unfortunately, six years of experiencing Les's true nature meant that there were no volunteers. Les and Kirk hatched a typically hopeless plan in which they would encounter a potentially violent man in the Rovers and Les would not react in his usual style to the provocation but would instead "turn the other cheek".

Kirk found ex-wrestler Swanny Gillen who used to perform under the sobriquet "Austrian Adolf" with a mask down to his upper lip on which he sported a Hitler-type moustache. They rehearsed their lines and Swanny made his way to the Rovers where he was deliberately rude to Bev Unwin and then went into the toilets awaiting Les and Kirk's arrival. When Les walked in, he saw Mick with fellow-copper Emma Watts already there and was put off staging his show in front of them but Kirk prevailed on him to continue. Swanny came up to them, accused Kirk of drinking his pint and when he became threatening, Les stepped in with the prepared line "violence never solved anything." Unfortunately he got this muddled up and, in the confusion as Kirk corrected him, Swanny swung his punch and connected hard with Les's right eye. When Swanny cried out, "Are you okay, Les? You were supposed to duck, pal!", everyone in the pub knew they'd been an unsuspecting audience of a put-on show. Back at No. 5, Swanny asked for his £20 fee and when Kirk revealed he had no money, he received a similar black eye to the one that Les sported. After Swanny left, Les advised Kirk to keep future bright ideas to himself.