BERN, Switzerland, Oct 2 - Euro 2008 organisers are facing a possible legal challenge over alleged similarities between the tournament's mascots and two well known German cartoon characters.

The mascots, unnamed twin boys with red, spiky hair, were unveiled at a news conference in Vienna last week with the tournament's Austrian and Swiss hosts calling on fans to give the pair names from a shortlist of: Flix and Trix, Zagi and Zigi and Flitz and Bitz.

The owner of the rights to Fix and Foxi, two cartoon twin boy foxes with apparently similar hair, face colouring and character attributes to the two mascots, was alerted to the new arrivals and says he is now consulting a lawyer.

"I think the superficial similarities are clear," Michael Simard told Reuters on Monday.

"I will wait to see what the lawyer says though and in particular whether there is any danger of confusion of the two brands. If he believes there is, I will get in contact with the tournament organisers."

At the Euro 2008 mascot launch, the tournament's organisers described one twin as being "the serious and self-controlled type" while the other "is more rebellious and creative".

On the Fix and Foxi official Web site, Fix is described as "the cheeky cunning one" while his brother is "more cautious and timid but always blindly following his twin."

Philippe Margraff, head of marketing operations at European soccer's governing body UEFA, told Reuters he had heard about the supposed similarities but was confident the Euro 2008 mascots were original creations.

"The legal advice we have received suggests that there is no direct relevance. I have not personally seen the other characters but our lawyers tell us that they are dissimilar.

An internet search carried out by Reuters suggested that the Euro 2008 tournament organisers could have further difficulties with the shortlist of names for their characters.

Zigi and Zagi have previously been used as the names for two mischievous brothers in the Superman comic series, while Trix and Flix comes up as the name of Cologne-based dance act.

Flitz and Bitz appear to be without any serious rivalry however.