Nike hit back in racism kit row

American sportswear giant Nike today defended its anti-racism campaign after England defender Gary Neville accused the company of cheapening football's battle against the racists.

Neville sparked a major new row by criticising Nike's Stand Up Speak Up campaign, launched last month by Manchester United team-mate Rio Ferdinand and Arsenal striker Thierry Henry.

On a historic night for the campaign against racism in the game, Nike made special black and white shirts for Holland to wear in last night's 0-0 draw with England.

Sven-Goran Eriksson's team wore red shirts with "say no to racism" on the front and players are being urged to show their support by wearing wrist-bands during matches.

But Neville risked a confrontation with United's kit suppliers Nike, which has a £300million 10-year deal with the club, by suggesting it was trying to get free publicity.

Simon Charlsworth, from Nike, said today: "The comments Gary Neville made are unfortunate. He is entitled to his opinion but there's no commercial gain in this for us at all.

"We don't believe it cheapens the fight against racism. It takes it to another level.

"Every team in the Premiership has received an explanation from us about the campaign and the vast majority of players are wearing the bands. If he has that opinion that's up to him."

Neville said: "We don't have a big problem with racism in this country, you can think of probably one or two incidents in the last five or 10 years. We have to make sure the campaign is conducted in the right manner and not done just for PR like some of the sports companies seem to be doing at the moment.

"The FA and England team have always campaigned against racism very well, we have just got to be aware that it's not cheapened slightly by companies like Nike getting a lot of PR out of it for nothing."

The kit row came after a drab friendly at Villa Park, where Eriksson's new-look formation did not work.