MANY readers will be shocked to learn that Britain's favourite sport, football, is playing a major role in the largest wildlife massacre in the world.

More than seven million kangaroos and their babies are to be slaughtered this year in Australia for meat and skins, which will be used to make many top brands of football boots.

Adult kangaroos are shot, often hit in the throat or neck and dragged to trucks struggling and still conscious.

Young 'joeys' still inside their mother's pouch suffer an equally barbaric death. They are pulled from the pouch and stamped on, clubbed to death, or simply left to die of starvation -- worthless by-products of a callous, but lucrative industry.

The exposure by the animal rights group Viva! of this horrific suffering caused huge public outcry and all of the major supermarkets pulled kangaroo meat from their shelves, but the kangaroo leather industry shares equal responsibility for this sickening massacre.

Readers who are appalled by this cruelty can ensure they are avoiding kangaroo leather by purchasing football boots made from state-of-the-art synthetic materials instead.

A EDWARDS (Mrs), Whalley New Road, Blackburn.