Pupils get a visit from Shrewsbury Town's Mickey Demetriou

Pupils at Mereside Primary School in were visited by Shrewsbury Town footballer Mickey Demetriou as part of the club's literacy scheme, which uses the sport as a way to get children interested in reading.

Jason Gathercole, deputy headteacher at the Shrewsbury school, said the project had proved a huge success so far.

He said: "It is fantastic because reading is a key part of the whole curriculum.

"It is an essential skill you have to have for anything, and anything we can do to encourage children to read is fantastic.

"It is really about getting them to read for pleasure so this is massively inspiring for them. We get lads reading on the way intoto school, asking to read at playtime."

The project, co-ordinated by Shrewsbury Town in the Community in conjunction with West Mercia Supplies, is being provided in a number of primary schools, and features several sessions which use different aspects of football and the club to engage the pupils.

They include writing a letter to Joe Hart, going through a specially made booklet about football and then answering questions about what they have read and writing a report about Shrewsbury Town's promotion season.

When the pupils have completed the work they then get to take part in a sports session.

The visit to Mereside also saw pupils able to quiz Mr Demetriou in a question and answer session, as he told them about his inspirations, the hard work required to fulfil your ambitions and the diet and training needed to be a footballer.

Mr Gathercole said: "We had Mr Demetriou in today who talked about how he stuck at his love of football, listened to what his coaches were saying and how that hard work paid off and how to relate that to life, be it reading, English, or sport.

"The children have produced some great work from the project and it is a wonderful inspirational way to encourage reading and hard work."