FOOTBALL banning orders against 17 Blackburn Rovers supporters will not be in place before Euro 2004 in Portugal, it has been revealed.

All 17 respondents are resisting the police applications.

A "deal" under which they would have surrendered their passports for the duration of the European Championships in return for the applications being dropped has been rejected by the police.

The cases against all 17 have been adjourned until July 8 for pre-trial review, when trial dates will be set by Blackburn magistrates.

Paul Schofield, whose firm Farley's Solicitors represents all the respondents, said individual hearings could take up to a week.

He said that, in his view, the respondents had adopted a very reasonable approach to the proceedings.

"They do not agree that orders should be made in any of the cases but they do understand the thrust of why the cases were brought," said Mr Schofield.

"They have all offered to surrender their passports to the police for the duration of Euro 2004.

"Those offers have been rejected by the police.

"While I find those decisions surprising in the particular circumstances, it is clearly a matter for the police. The sad fact is that these cases can't be tried for many months and they will now take up a lot of court time and public expense," he added.

But Mr John Sandiford, for the Chief Constable, said it had been a condition of the deal that the police "abandoned" all the evidence they had collected over the last three years.

"That evidence would be confined to history and could never be relied upon again," said Mr Sandiford.

"If the police were to come for a football banning order in the future they would have been starting from scratch. No use could have been made of the evidence collected with great care and diligence over a number of years.

"The police considered that was not acceptable and they see no alternative but to proceed with the football banning orders on the evidence that they have."