AN exhibition featuring black footballers was officially opened at a primary school in Stretford by Manchester United winger Ryan Giggs.

The collection of eight laminated posters, which will be at Victoria Park Junior School until the end of November, details some of the most famous names in football as part of the national Kick It Out campaign.

The exhibition, aimed at kicking racism out of football, includes information on England's first black captain and former Manchester United player Paul Ince and ex-Liverpool and England midfielder John Barnes.

The excited schoolchildren were treated to a question and answer session with the famous footballer, and Ryan discussed how having a black father, who also played professional rugby, affected his childhood.

Ryan said: "My father was quite famous in the area and everyone at school knew who he was. There weren't many black children at school and because I was good at football people picked up on both those things.

"In the early days, when I was growing up, John Barnes used to get bananas thrown at him but he, among others, stood up to racism and made it better for players today. There are a lot of great footballers who are black and they are able to rise above the name calling and let their feet do the talking."

Ryan later told SUM: "Playing international football I've seen and heard a lot of racist abuse. It tends to be in the countries where they don't have any black players and you get sections of the crowd booing when the black players are on the ball."

After playing schoolboy football for England, Ryan now plays international football for Wales but if he could play for any other national team he would chose Brazil.

Ryan said: "When I was younger, I used to watch Brazil because they were the pick of the top teams, so I would have liked to play for them. It's very disappointing not being able to play against teams like Brazil in major competitions. It's every player's dream to play in major championships but unfortunately it just keeps getting harder."

In 1983, 12 out of the 22 top-flight clubs had black players in their squads and now all 20 premier league clubs have black players. Asian players are still greatly under-represented and this issue is now being addressed.

The school's exhibition features the slogan 'the only colour that really matters is the colour of a player's shirt' and a banner reading 'not black, not white, but red' was displayed at Old Trafford during Manchester United's game against Bolton Wanderers on Saturday.

Representatives from both clubs and Roxanne Buckley from Stretford High School also signed an anti-racism pledge before the match to reject racism and make Old Trafford a welcoming place for all people, regardless of their ethnic origin or colour.