Children at a secondary in the North East have been designing accessories for WAGs as part of World Cup-themed lessons.

Youngsters in Years 7 and 8 at Gillbrook College in Middlesbrough have been drawing up designs for WAG essentials such as designer shoes, hats and - perhaps most crucial of all - fingernails.

WAGs are the wives and girlfriends, traditionally former catwalk models or pop singers, who are the partners of multimillionaire Premiership footballers.

Designing jewellery for wannabe Victoria Beckhams is not the only World Cup-related work the school has been undertaking.

Pupils have also been learning how to design football stadiums in IT classes, remix national anthems as part of their music work and improve their pronunciation skills thanks to the efforts of a local BBC football commentator.

But it is their artwork that the 140 girls and boys are particularly proud of.

The scheme has been put together by art teacher Paul Julian, who said: “The kids have loved it. It’s shown how creative learning and football can bring the whole school together.

“The WAGs stuff has been fun and has also involved designing skirts and T- shirts.”

Ironically, England manager Fabio Capello has banned the WAGs from attending this year’s World Cup in South Africa. He is keen to avoid a repetition of events in Germany four years ago, when the antics of England footballers’ partners made front-page news throughout the tournament.

Children at Gillbrook were limited to designing WAG accessories for eight of the 32 countries involved in this year’s tournament - Germany, Brazil, Argentina, Italy, South Africa, Spain, Holland and England.