Croydon police’s borough commander has downplayed fears of summer riots after officers were put on alert over possible gang violence at public events in London.

The Metropolitan Police has reportedly warned officers to be prepared for riots and gang attacks after a series of violent outbreaks in central London last week, at which five police officers were injured in Hyde Park, Hackney, Marble Arch and Burgess Park.

According to The Times, Scotland Yard has warned that gangs may cause trouble at Notting Hill Carnival over the August bank holiday weekend and a march to mark the anniversary of the death of Mark Duggan.

Mr Duggan was shot dead by police on August 6, 2011, sparking riots that spread across the country, including to Croydon.

But Chief Superintendent Andy Tarrant said there was nothing to “cause concern” in Croydon, adding a repeat of the 2011 riots was unlikely.

He said: “We are closely monitoring it and there is nothing in terms of issues locally that we are concerned about.

“There is a full-scale operation in place and we have got additional officers on duty which we are putting into different areas of the borough.

“But there have been no incidents that would arise or cause me concern in relation to what happened in central London last week.”

Violence broke out at Hyde Park on Tuesday last week after crowds gathered for a large water fight. The Met said officers stepped in to “protect the public and themselves” after people attempted to play music from a sound system.

Chief Supt Tarrant said: “We do get unlicensed music events and we are monitoring any intelligence in relation to those.

“Our response would be primarily looking for the intelligence bit, so identifying what was going on, where it might happen, and then we develop a policing plan around it.

“Ultimately we want to go for a prevention based approach and there is specific legislation for dealing with unlicensed music events and we would deploy sufficient resources to anything to prevent it from taking place. That is foremost in my mind.

“At the moment as we haven’t got any scheduled coming up but, to me, it is likely to be something spontaneous and probably something like an unlicensed music event.”

In June 2014, about 2,000 poured into East Croydon in a bid to attend an unlicensed rave at a disused Royal Mail sorting office.

An officer had received a tip-off about the event but did not act upon it and the rave was eventually broken up by riot police.

Rio Andrew, a 15-year-old boy, fell ill after taking ecstasy at the rave and died in hospital the next day.