The England manager Fabio Capello has already stated that he doesn’t want the footballers WAGs disrupting the teams training sessions and game preparations during this summers World Cup, and he is gathering support from the players.
The Chelsea midfielder Frank Lampard has already spoken out in Capellos defence, and now Wayne Rooney and Steven Gerrard has also agreed that their wives won’t be around for the all-important group stages.
The Man Utd striker Rooney said: “If they want to come and support us there’s nothing stopping them,” he said. “Last time we were all together in the hotel and that was a bit of a problem. My wife’s just had a baby so she’s not going anyway.”
And the Liverpool captain Gerrard said: “I don’t know if having the WAGs there affected our performance last time.
“I can’t tell you that, but my wife won’t be there this time, not unless we get to the semis or the final. She’s got two kids who’ll be in school and it’s a long way away. If we get to the semis, she deserves to come and see me.”
Alex also admitted that she wouldn’t be in South Africa for long: ‘I’ll only be in Sun City for a few days. It’s so far and I’m not into football. Steve makes me watch but I don’t understand it.’
Rio Ferdinand was another supporter of the ban on WAGs and agrees that it may have affected England’s performances last time around.
“If I’m honest, we became a bit of a circus in terms of the whole Wag situation,” said the Man Utd defender. “It seemed like there was a big show around the whole England squad. It was like watching a theatre unfolding and football almost became a secondary element to the main event.
“People were worrying more about what people were wearing and where they were going out, rather than the England football team. That then transposed itself into the team. That’s said in hindsight. At the time we were caught up in the bubble ourselves. Being somewhere like Baden-Baden, walking around the town, there were paparazzi everywhere, our families were there. When you step back and look back at that, it was like a circus.
“I’m not going to tell the other players what you should or should not do. But I just think that, as a squad, we were a bit too open, going out in and around Baden-Baden, and probably had too much contact with families. That’s just my opinion. Some players may think they’d rather have that contact with their families.
“But you’re in a tournament and you don’t get to play in many tournaments in your career. To give yourself the best chance, you have to be focused. Having the families around and the paparazzi that were following us, it was all a bit too close and the football wasn’t really separated from it all.”
You just have to admit that quite of few of the England footballers WAGs would distract anybody! (Especially John Terry)
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