School to watch replay of England match together

A primary school in Wolverhampton is to hold a watch party for pupils to see a re-run of the England World Cup match together.

Villiers Primary School in Bilston have asked children to keep the score secret if they are staying up with families to watch the match against Mexico, which starts at 01:00 BST.

Assistant headteacher, Carly McKenzie, told BBC 5 Live's Sunday Breakfast show they are doing an as-live watch-along at 09:00 BST on Monday.

Some of the teachers are going to try to avoid the result too, including turning off their social media, she added.

The BBC will be hosting a special 'Stay Up or Catch Up' offer for its live coverage of England's game against Mexico at the Fifa World Cup.

McKenzie told presenter Jeanette Kwakye that the children had been enjoying the competition, and they had wondered how to mark the last-16 knockout match.

"We were thinking about what to do and we had lots of different ideas," she said.

"One of them was to have lots of different football skill drills on the field and to get them taking part in different activities on that day to celebrate the England game.

"But then we thought on the build up to it, you know what, lets just let them watch it."

Children who have seen it already were in line for a relaxing morning, she said, but it was hoped they would not reveal the result.

"We've asked if they are going go and watch it on the evening with their families, we absolutely understand that, it's something that the children want to celebrate with them.

"But we have asked them, and I don't know how this will work, but we've asked them to keep it a secret as much as possible, with the score.

"We are going to watch it all together at 9 o'clock."

The school, which has about 700 children, had been "really excited" about the World Cup and held activities in the build-up to it, the assistant headteacher said.

One of their teachers is a semi-professional goalkeeper and they had gone out "class by class" to try a penalty shoot out against them.

McKenzie added: "Regardless of whether we win, hopefully we do. But regardless of what happens, I think our children are going to remember this for a really long time."

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