SEVEN football teams have been told that after Christmas they will be homeless.

The footballers who play at Sheerness Steel's ground at Holm Place will be locked out midway through the season and forced to watch the ground fall into disrepair, following Sheerness steel mill's closure.

It's another blow to the fabric of the Island community, which is already trying to cope with the loss of hundreds of jobs.

Sheerness Steel United who play in the Medway Today Sunday League, four junior sides from under-9s to under-16s, plus Sheppey Sunday League's Goat Inn and Brambledown Sports will need somewhere else to play after Christmas.

Richard Elderfield, Sheerness Steel's secretary, said: "We've been informed that from January 1 we will have no ground. The gates will be locked and the clubhouse will be allowed to mothball.

"We have been left in limbo and the receivers have offered us no other provisions, but we are not going to sit down and die."