Mindless creatures called the WAGS

One sideshow from the England contingent at the World Cup has to be the antics of the WAGS. Who you ask? Surely you have heard of the WAGS. They are as important as the players themselves, perhaps even more popular at times. Still don’t know? Okay, I am talking about the wives and girlfriends of the footballer (aka the WAGS).

I don’t think in the past they have been in the limelight as much as they have been this summer. British newspapers had a number of reporters to cover them – to see what they were doing when their partners/husbands were busy preparing for the matches.

And these WAGS didn’t disappoint anyone. At times, the UK dailies, especially the tabloids, gave them more coverage than the players. The Sun and The Mirror were trying to outsell each other by dedicating pages and pages with photos and snippets of what these WAGS were up to.

So we had stories of these girls boozing and shopping daily. In fact that was what they were up to throughout their stay in Baden-Baden, which was the HQ for the England team. Media reports spoke about daily long night drinking sessions costing some 4,000 pounds and shopping sprees involving amounts equivalent to the GDP of a small third world nation - designer dresses and sunglasses top the list.

They still made it to the frontpages even when they did not go out shopping. On July 3, these WAGS had other plans and the British papers screamed: “England WAGs give the shopping a rest!”

And then you will also see them in the stadiums, cheering their men. You won’t miss them at all. These are the girls who wear big shades, tiny dresses, well made up and give that prompt cheers when they know the cameras are zooming on them.

Another common trait in them is that they are all dressed up to the nines. They’re all highly competitive - each one wants to out-glam the next.


The England WAGS are divided into at least two groups. In one corner, we have the first lady of WAGS Victoria Beckham. She was always seen with singer Cheryl Tweed (fiancée of Ashley Cole). (pix above)

And then we have the clique involving the others - Coleen McLoughlin (Wayne Rooney), Carly Zucker (Joe Cole), Alex Curran (Steven Gerrard), Elen Rives (Frank Lampard), Michaela Henderson-Thynne (Stuart Downing), Lisa Roughead (Michael Carrick) and Toni Poole (John Terry), and others.

In the beginning the novelty of these WAGS took pressure off the team, but after weeks of almost identical behaviour the thrill just faded away.

So much so, the Daily Mail said that “their charm has waned…They possess no curiosity about anything other than clothes, champagne and their reflections. Empty days, mindless nights”.

After the woeful performance of the England players, the British media is now slowly coming round to lay the blame on the WAGS – for being such a distraction to the players!

On the day after England’s defeat to Portugal, these WAGS were jeered and booed off by angry England fans.

For once, we didn’t not see them posing for the media photographers and doing things openly. These WAGS were now into hiding, waiting to get back to England!

With their reputations tattered, one of them, Cheryl, now further strains the image by trying to maintain a distance from the rest. She claimed that she was shocked by the vanity of the other WAGS. She further invited the wrath of the rest by labeling them materialistic.

This is surely not the end of this matter. I am waiting to see how the other WAGS will react.

(This article first appeared in my World Cup blog.)