A row has broken out between two sports clubs who both want to play on pitches in Bradford.

Victoria Rangers Rugby League club and newly-formed Ravenscliffe AFC are at loggerheads over who is entitled to use pitches at the former Eccleshill Upper School.

The furious football team claim a set of posts they put up were chopped down without warning, leaving them with nowhere to practise.

But the rugby club said the footballers had used a lawnmower to mark out a pitch across the rugby field which they lease from Bradford Council.

Volunteer youth leader John Bolton, of Ravenscliffe Avenue, said he established Ravenscliffe AFC three months ago for youngsters from the estate who wanted to play soccer.

The team will play its matches in Peel Park, Undercliffe, when it starts in the Telegraph & Argus League next month - but it wants to practise locally.

"We have very little in Ravenscliffe and I have identified a need for a football team," said Mr Bolton. "They already have four rugby pitches there and there is plenty of room for a football pitch. I am quite willing to share these resources.

"I am extremely upset and disappointed when we are trying to work to get kids off the street and crime rates down."

But John Hodgson, president of Victoria Rangers, said steel goalposts had been put up across a rugby pitch and had been removed by Bradford Council as they were unsafe.

"I am still happy for them to practise there but they cannot just walk onto a site and put posts up without asking."

He said plans - led by Victoria Rangers and Holybrook Primary School - were being drawn up for a multi-purpose sports pitch and changing rooms to be used by people in the Newlands area.

A spokesman for Bradford Council said they understood a set of goalposts had been removed but this had not been carried out by the Council.

"Our parks and landscape service maintain the playing fields and Victoria Rangers Rugby Club have an agreement to use the rugby pitches.

"It is our understanding that the community is traditionally allowed to use these fields."

Jim Smith, chief executive of Newlands Partnership, said £200,000 had been earmarked for sports facilities. "We hope the whole community would be involved," he added.