WHAT sort of role models do footballers provide young children?

There are the pampered, preening type of players who have more money than sense and who have lost respect for authority and the ordinary people who pay their wages. They are poor role models.

Then there are players like Newcastle's Joey Barton - in court again yesterday while serving a six month prison sentence for assault.

They are bad role models.

But there is another type of footballer who can inspire young children.

This weekend, the Tees Valley produces two new international footballers. Yesterday, James Morrison, from Darlington, made his debut for Scotland. Tomorrow, David Wheater, from Redcar, is likely to make his debut for England.

Morrison's family proudly gathered around the television set while, in the distant Czech Republic, he became his home town's first international player for many years. Hundreds more, from his school and his local clubs, will also have been following his progress with great interest.

Hopefully, tomorrow Wheater will also bring pride to his home town. Just playing for Middlesbrough has made him into someone local children look up to, as he told The Northern Echo only in February: "The other day, I had a kid come up to me and say, I can't believe you're a football card'. It's like I'm a superhero and I have to say I'm a real person you know'."

While both men, still in their early twenties, probably - and understandably - have their moments of youthful impetuosity, they are living the dream.

They are what every schoolboy dreams of becoming, and what every schoolboy's parents and grandparents dream he will become as they act as minibus and launderette. And they haven't made it through privilege or nepotism.

They have made it on merit, through their own hard work and dedication.

These are footsteps that hopefully other pupils at Darlington's Hummersknott and Redcar's Sacred Heart schools can aspire to follow in.

Good luck to them.