Shoes that football stars Jonathan Woodgate and Lee Bowyer were seen wearing on video on the night an Asian student was attacked were almost certainly not the ones they later handed over to police, their trial was told on Thursday.

Home Office forensic chemist Geoffrey Gray told Hull Crown Court that he had studied the film of the two Leeds United players outside a city centre nightclub on the night when Sarfraz Najeib, 20, was allegedly kicked and beaten senseless by the two men and others after a confrontation and chase.

He had also been handed pairs of shoes the two players claimed to have been wearing on the night.

``There is strong support for the assertion that these shoes were not the ones worn on the evening in question,'' he said.

``To my mind there are differences.''

Mr Gray said the shoes Woodgate was seen wearing on the video as he entered the Majestyk were seen to have a heel.

But the black Snipe pair he claimed to have been wearing on the night of the attack, in January last year, had a flat sole.

The shoes Bowyer was seen wearing on the videotape had a bright reflection from the top which could have been caused by a buckle - but not by the small metal bar on the pair the player handed over.

Mr Gray said he had examined photographs of the injuries to Mr Najeib's face and thought one bore the marks of kicking or stamping with a shoe.

But the pattern did not match that on the soles of any of several pairs of shoes handed to police by Bowyer, Woodgate or other defendants.

Woodgate, 21, of Middlesbrough, Bowyer 24, an England Under-21 international, of Leeds, Tony Hackworth, 20, a reserve team striker of Leeds and Neale Caveney and Paul Clifford, both 21, of Middlesbrough, deny causing grievous bodily harm with intent to Mr Najeib of Rotherham, South Yorkshire. They also deny affray.

Woodgate, Caveney and Clifford, with Leeds United player Michael Duberry, 24, also deny conspiring to pervert the course of justice after the attack, which happened in January last year.

-- Anonymous, March 01, 2001