Luck ran out for the mastermind of a ‘ridiculous’ burglary plot when he was snared in a betting shop while on the run.

Simon McDonagh led a gang who dressed up as workmen before trying to drill their way into a petrol station cash machine containing £45,000.

McDonagh was snared at the scene by a police dog, and admitted conspiracy to burgle.

However he failed to show up on the day of sentence - April Fools Day - when four of his accomplices were sent down, and spent a month at large.

Police caught up with McDonagh after he got angry after losing money at Ladbrokes, at Oxford Road, last month. His losing streak continued when officers established he was wanted, and he has now been jailed for 49 months, after also admitting a charge of handling a stolen Ford Fiesta.

Watch: Mole gang robbers drill into petrol station cash machine - as customers stroll by

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Footage previously published by the MEN shows McDonagh and two other members of the gang posing as workmen on a plot of wasteground behind Harvest Energy petrol station on Cheetham Hill Road in September last year.

They brought in a generator and an industrial drill in an attempt to get into the cash machine through the floor of the petrol station shop, even though it was a busy Saturday afternoon and customers were coming and going.

Police acting on a tip-off caught them in the act, and the gang scattered, scaling fences and discarding their hard hats and hi-visibility jackets as they fled.

In other footage published by the MEN a police handler and his dog, Max, can be seen pursuing McDonagh up a flight of stairs before Max goes after McDonagh, who was captured and taken to hospital with bite injuries.

The gang flee the scene

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Sentencing McDonagh, 30, of Victoria Street, Openshaw, who has a lengthy record for dishonesty, Judge David Hernandez said: “I’ve described it as an audacious plot, but in some respects it was a ridiculous plan. You were drilling through the floor on a Saturday afternoon and it was difficult to understand how the drilling would not be heard by those inside the building.”

Four other men have alrweady been sentenced for the plot, which they called ‘The Italian Job’.

The gang’s driver, father-of-two Osman Yirticisahin, 33, of Fernclough Road, Harpurhey, was jailed for three years. McDonagh’s sidekick Damien Green, 35, of The Boulevard, Didsbury, was also imprisoned for three years.

The gang’s look-out Omar Syed Iqbal, 33, of Ellesmere Street, Rochdale , was caged for three years and nine months, and another look-out Asghar Ahmed, 22, of Equitable Street, Rochdale, was jailed for one year and eight months after he admitted assisting an offender.

Top: Osman Yirticisahin and Omar Syed Iqbal. Bottom: Damien Green and Asghar Ahmed