In the blue corner stands the President, controversial Norfolk high street solicitor Martin Mears, with his deputy, west London practitioner Robert Sayer.

In the red corner stand their avowed opponents.

They are known to repudiate almost all of what the incumbents stand for, but have yet to put forward their own presidential candidate.As concrete evidence that the Law Society's presidential election build-up is more than just a phantom pregnancy, Chancery Lane staff have been placed on an election footing.

Guidelines have been circulated on what activities are, and are not, appropriate during the pre-election period.Until recently the anti-Mears faction was known only by its leading personalities.

Mr Mears' arch-rival, Council member and south London legal aid solicitor Eileen Pembridge, has said that she will stand against him if nobody else will.

But if the substantial sums riding on the candidacy of her Council colleague Tony Girling have been wisely placed, she will not have to live up to this pledge.In a widely publicised move, less than a fortnight ago a formal campaign was launched by opponents of Mr Mears which called on Council members to put forward alternative leaders.

The so-called campaign for new leadership (CNL) trumpeted itself as a grass-roots movement of ordinary solicitors.The CNL's letterhead listed the names of ten 'committee' members along with their locations.

In case anyone was in doubt of its claims to a national presence, these members came from all over the country: Coventry, Nottingham, Oxford, Northampton, Manchester, London, Wrexham, Cornwall, Gateshead and Bristol.At the launch, a professionally produced press pack with copies of letters calling for change was issued to the profession, local law societies and the Council.

It also included a point-by-point attack on the incumbents' record, entitled 'The rise and fall of Martin Mears and Robert Sayer'.

A page of press cuttings and tabloid headlines, such as 'A dinosaur at the Law Society' was bundled with a response form for those who wished publicly to back the campaign.

The CNL admits it 'had some assistance with the press release'.Mr Mears' responded by accusing the campaign leaders of being 'a small band of establishment groupies'.

In his column in this week's Gazette, he derides them as the Campaign to Bring Back Buggins.

Mr Sayer, writing in the legal press, also called them 'current or former establishment figures' and added that 'wrapping old fish in fresh paper doesn't make it smell any sweeter'.One week after the CNL launch its chairman, Coventry practitioner Kevin Martin, of KJ Martin & Co, was unrepentant.

He vigorously rejected the idea that he or his committee were 'establishment' Law Society people, although he admitted that there were some links with Chancery Lane.He acknowledged that three committee members were local society past presidents: Nottingham-based John Pearce, Oxford-based Euan Temple, (both vice-chairmen of the CNL), and Bristol-based Tony Miles.

And several of them -- Mr Martin and five others -- had been active members of the Young Solicitors Group but at different times, he said, insisting that these facts did not denote establishment origins.On the breadth of CNL support, Mr Martin is on shakier ground.

Some 600 letters were sent to solicitors selected for their anticipated sympathy, but only just over 100 responses had been received one week after they were mailed.

Mr Martin put on a brave face: 'The important thing is that we've only had two adverse responses.

That seems to me to be pretty encouraging.'This question lies at the heart of any presidential election campaign.

While Mr Mears won office last year with a bare majority of the vote, there is a widespread perception that he may still command the loyalty of many high street solicitors.

Mr Mears has confirmed that he is welcomed enthusiastically as he attends solicitors' functions around the country.

But Mr Martin stressed that in his own area it was 'hard to find solicitors who had a good word to say about Mr Mears'.A second member of the CNL's ruling triumvirate, John Pearce, senior partner of Young & Pearce in Nottingham since 1965 and local law society president in 1994/95, argued that Mr Mears was not good for the profession whatever his grass roots support.

He said: 'It's like in a political party.

If removing the leader would boost the morale of the party, that's what you have to do.

At the end of the day, something is wrong in Chancery Lane and has to be put right.'