More Than Just A Pretty Face
More Than Just A Pretty Face
A deep-dive on the evolution of WAG culture ⚽️
WAG culture has dominated British tabloids for more than two decades. From Vogue covers to Netflix documentaries, the wives and girlfriends of football players have established themselves as celebrities in their own right. Behind the Chanel sunglasses and Prada handbags, however, is a different story: lives tainted by continuous scrutiny, judgment and hateful social media comments. What’s it like living in the shadow of your partner? In this article, I’m taking a deep dive into what it means to be a WAG.
Pre-Match Notes
WAG is an abbreviation for “wives and girlfriends” and is most commonly used to describe the partners of professional footballers.
The term first came to prominence in the early noughties, when it was used in a Sunday Telegraph article discussing the partners of the players attending the 2002 World Cup in Japan: ‘It was never guaranteed that the wives and girlfriends (or “the Wags”, as staff at the Jumeriah Beach Club call them for short) would get along. Mrs Beckham’s tongue, for one thing, has previously run away with itself.’ From its first usage, the term WAG has been derogatory. The 2006 World Cup in Germany only amplified this, with reports of the women dancing on table tops with bottles of Moet a-plenty in Baden-Baden plastered across newspapers.
Nymia Jobe for The Guardian writes:
‘The press soon labelled them “hooligans with credit cards”, and it was reported that some spent £57,000 in one hour during a shopping trip and £25,000 on alcohol, mainly champagne’.
The criticism cut deeper than that: the women were lightning rods for classist and sexist remarks. In 2006, Marina Hyde commented:
'It has produced a riot of censorious articles in some sections of the press which have essentially reminded us that working class people shouldn't have money because they're only vulgar with it.’
The press even had the audacity to blame them for England’s poor performance in the competition -
‘Fabio Capello has made great show of sidelining the Wags, the implication being that Alex, Coleen, Carly et al wrecked their boys' focus and fitness in 2006, presumably by clattering into their hotel rooms giggling and tipsy on their Louboutins and then disturbing the athletes' beauty sleep by wanting to hold late-night marital conferences about what best to wear to brunch with the girls the next day’.
The misogyny is so loud I can’t even hear myself think.
The press coverage created a stereotype of women obsessed with their luxe lifestyles and vivacious social lives. They were pampered party girls whose lives were funded by their partners. The stereotype has been inescapable ever since.
The Team Sheet
WAGs are like the seasons - they come and go. The level of attention they receive partly comes down to how prominent their partner is within the public eye. For the WAGs of the most famous players, the pressure is on. All eyes are on their appearance, their match day outfits, their reactions at the full time whistle.
In the early days, we had icons like Victoria Beckham, who met her husband David (a midfielder at Manchester United) when she was at her peak in nineties girl band the Spice Girls (but I didn’t need to tell you that). She was dubbed “Queen WAG” throughout the 2006 World Cup era. Alongside her was Cheryl, the (now ex) wife of Chelsea left-back Ashley Cole. She was also in a high profile girl band of the noughties, Girls Aloud. Abbey Clancy, the wife of Peter Crouch, and Coleen Rooney, wife of Wayne, were also part of the club.
In 2024, we have a glossy new group of women to read all about in the papers. Sasha Attwood is a model and the partner of Jack Grealish, while Lauren Fryer is Declan Rice’s childhood sweetheart. Bukayo Saka’s girlfriend Tolami Benson recently had a Vogue article written about her, while central defender Harry Maguire’s wife Fern has a first-class degree in physiotherapy, and England captain Harry Kane’s wife Kate is an advocate for mental health education, going into UK schools to deliver talks to children.
In 2024, the lives of WAGs are documented in a very different way to the early 00s, with social media taking the reins. Many of the women have adopted influencer-style roles, while some prefer to stay completely private. One thing remains the same: they are the accessory.
News From The Red Tops
The introduction of social media is a dramatic difference to the WAG culture of the early 00s. The women are more accessible than ever before, and while this means they can show us glimpses into their lives and take more control over their narrative, it also means they are exposed to an abundance of trolling and judgement from strangers.
Following the 2020 Euros, Sasha Attwood discussed the online abuse she received:
‘I was receiving, like, 200 death threats a day. I’m not exaggerating when I say that. All day every day. […] The scary thing is it’s young girls. I go on these girls’ accounts who have sent me stuff and they’re literally, like, thirteen-fourteen.’
Attwood also discussed that she had previously chosen to keep her relationship private because ‘people are mean’, but that she had never expected the reaction to her relationship to be as extreme as it was. And who can blame her? This is a woman being shamed and threatened because of who her boyfriend is. Think about how absurd that is for a moment.
In 2024, Declan Rice’s partner Lauren Fryer was the victim of an avalanche of abuse online, and in the football stadium, because her appearance. Football fans were chanting abusive remarks about Fryer as Rice prepared to take a corner. A nasty tweet declaring that Rice had ‘low standards’ went viral, with women clubbing together in defence of Fryer, who deleted her Instagram account as a result.
This was a shocking reminder that sexism is still alive and kicking in football, that to some, the purpose of a woman’s appearance is to satisfy the male gaze. Abusive chants and comments within football have seemingly become normalised; it’s when they get personal and cross a boundary that we are reminded how barbaric this behaviour truly is. On what other occasion would you hear someone freely yell something like this at another person? Fryer is undoubtedly a beautiful woman, yet she doesn’t fit into the stereotypical beauty standard idealised by her trolls, and, boy, will she pay for it! It’s probably a result of over-exposure to sexualised content and unprocessed male insecurity, but that’s for another essay. No-one should ever be made to feel this way, however to some football fans it is apparently appropriate to make personal, incomprehensible jibes at players and their families for the sake of the game.
Victoria Beckham fell victim to a similar chant in the nineties, which she opened up about in her 2023 Netflix documentary, Beckham: ‘75,000 people were singing that. It’s embarrassing. It’s hurtful.’ The media presentation of WAGs appears to have desensitised football fans to the point that they don’t see these women as people anymore - they’re an image, an extension of the men on the pitch, a tool that can be used to distract them during a penalty shoot-out or to heckle them after a foul. Through no fault of their own, WAGs are falling victim to football hooliganism.
Half Time Analysis: Vardy v Rooney Case Study
One of the most infamous events in WAG history was the 2022 Vardy v Rooney trial, involving the wife of Jamie Vardy, Rebekah, and the wife of Wayne Rooney, Coleen. Disney+ made a three-part documentary on Rooney’s side of the story, and there’s also been an ITV drama and a musical. One news report said, ‘We’ve had some fierce contenders for most bizarre story of the year, but this has to be up there.’
I’ll give you a very brief summary in case you somehow managed to miss it -
‘In 2019, Rooney announced on Twitter that the Instagram account that was leaking the posts from her private Instagram account to the British newspaper The Sun was "Rebekah Vardy's account". In 2020, Vardy sued Rooney for libel, and the case came to trial in London in May 2022. On 29 July 2022, the court dismissed Vardy's claim on the basis that Rooney's statements were substantially true. Vardy was ordered to pay a substantial proportion of Rooney's legal expenses, which, together with her own legal costs, have been estimated to total £3 million.’ - via Wikipedia.
The accusation and trial became the subject of wide media attention. Rooney was dubbed ‘Wagatha Christie’, relating to the fact that she’d done her own sleuthing to uncover the account responsible for the leaks.
There was a hyper-fixation on both women, with journalists scrambling to determine who was the villain.
In an interview with British Vogue, Rooney opened up about her experience with the trial. She expressed relief that she won the case, but said that Vardy was ‘obviously going through it…I just thought, “Why have you put yourself in this position?” It was not nice to watch’. In her Disney+ documentary, Rooney appears visibly distressed by the whole incident, describing it as 'one of the most horrible times I’ve been through in my life.’
Vardy, who was pregnant at the time, received large scale public shaming. Following the trial, she said: ‘Please can the people who have been abusing me and my family now stop, the case is over’, while Judge Karen Steyn said, ‘Nothing of which Mrs. Vardy has been accused, nor any of the findings in this judgment, provide any justification or excuse for subjecting her or her family, or any other person involved in this case, to such vitriol’, adding that abuse included ‘messages wishing her, her family, and even her then-unborn baby, ill in the most awful terms.’ She’s right - the media scrutiny and coverage was extremely overwhelming given the nature of the trial.
Despite the emotional challenges this trial clearly presented for both women, they have used the attention to their advantages. As mentioned, Rooney was on the September 2023 cover of British Vogue and had her perspective of the trial covered in her documentary The Real Wagatha Story. She also released an autobiography aptly titled My Account. Vardy trademarked the phrase ‘Wagatha Christie’. The BBC writes that ‘The move could go some way to paying Vardy's legal costs from the trial. In October, it was reported that she had been ordered to pay 90% of Rooney's legal fees, expected to equate to £1.5m.’ Both women have come out of the trial appearing extremely savvy and strategic.
The abuse on social media and pressure from the media would not have been so intense had these women not been WAGs. What’s fascinating to me is that despite all the attention and heavy press coverage both women received, I still don’t know much about them aside from who they are married to. The whole ordeal became a spectacle because it was like witnessing a ‘catfight’ within the ultimate girl gang. There was never any sort of indication about caring for either party’s wellbeing or even if anyone cared who was right or wrong - it was entertainment.
The Offside Rule
Victoria Beckham was crowned “Queen WAG” in the early noughties. Though today she is remembered for more than her marital status, with an iconic music career and fashion line, there was an immense discomfort in the early days of her relationship and marriage to David.
The fact is, Victoria can never be accused of riding on the coat tails of a famous footballer. She was as famous as David Beckham when they got together, and therefore she has been able to create her own success independent of him. In Beckham, David says that he was watching television with fellow footballer Gary Neville when he saw Victoria on screen: ‘I turned round to Gary, I went “see that one there, I’m gonna marry that one” and we’re laughing and joking and I’m like “no, I’m going to marry that one, the Posh one, the one in the black dress.”’
In a culture that insists on viewing WAGs as an accessory to their partner, it is intimidating when the media is met with someone they can’t squeeze into their mould. The answer? Take her down, of course!
Recalling the period that she stayed at home while David moved to Real Madrid, Victoria said, ‘I was always the villain’. She said when she covered Spanish Vogue, they claimed that she hated Spain because it ‘smells of garlic’ - ‘I didn’t say that!’.
She was depicted as cold and unfeeling - the fact that she had two children to care for was conveniently overlooked to perpetuate the chosen narrative. ‘Everything I did was fabricated, taken out of context.’
In recent years, most references of the two of them together have been on their own terms - Vogue covers, Instagram posts, public appearances, Netflix documentaries. Victoria is no longer shamed for her relationship, rather together they make the perfect “power couple”.
The same can be said of Taylor Swift, who can never be reduced to the WAG label because of her own status. Her relationship with American football player Travis Kelce has been widely documented as a fairy tale-like love story. Still, NFL fans complained that her image was shown on the TV too much. Swift said, ‘I’m just there to support Travis. I have no awareness of if I’m being shown too much and pissing off a few dads, Brads and Chads.’
The message this suggests is that women have to prove their value prior to getting into their relationships to exist as an individual outside of them, and even then, it’s uncomfortable for some to cope with a powerful feminine figure taking up a traditionally masculine space.
Despite all this, so many women want to be them. Why?
The short answer to this question is money and glamour. Immediate wealth, a surge in Instagram followers, and many people still consider a successful partner to increase their personal value, too. Luxury holidays, Chanel bags, the best table at the fanciest restaurants. Many of these women have come from a working class background and so on the outside it appears like a Cinderella story.
Like with any celebrity, we see an image represented in the media and decide we want it for ourselves. In a 2010 article, Kira Cochrane wrote, ‘By the 21st century, we might have expected the idea of women being defined by their male partners to have died – along with the idea of marriage as a career path. And yet, when it comes to the Wag obsession, we seem to have regressed many decades.’ It amazes me that an article written fourteen years ago is still relevant today, especially in a day and age where women are working so hard to create their own successes.
My research has shown me that this ideal is merely a facade and the reality of being the partner of a professional footballer is actually pretty strenuous.
For a start, I was stunned when I read further into Cochrane’s piece:
‘Many aspects of Wags' lives bring to mind a sort of 1950s womanhood: they seem to be expected to come when called and, equally, to stay away when they're not wanted. (There was the notorious Manchester United Christmas party in 2007, when the Wags were apparently told to stay at home, 100 handpicked women were brought in to party with the players, and the night ended with a rape allegation that was later dropped.)’
I hope that things have changed since then, but for this to have occurred as recently as 2007 is abysmal.
Aside from the immediate judgement instilled upon them, life as a WAG can be incredibly lonely. They have to be prepared to pack up their lives overnight if their partner is signed to a new club, leave behind friends and family and start a new life somewhere else. It’s isolating. Coleen Rooney said she felt ‘homesick’ after relocating her family to America to support Wayne Rooney’s career. It’s no surprise so many of them have taken up careers as social media influencers - they can work for themselves and have a life outside of their partners. It must be exhausting living in someone else’s shadow and continuously having your successes undermined by your partner’s.
The alternative to following their partner wherever their career takes them is staying behind and going long-distance. Singer Leigh-Anne Pinnock discussed her relationship with Andre Grey on the Table Manners podcast,
‘We have a long-distance relationship. He lives in Saudi, he plays football there, so for the last two years, we’ve been apart basically, seeing each other for like, maybe two days a month. It’s been hell, to be honest.’
With all the headlines and Instagram posts portraying a life of luxury, it can be easy to forget that these people experience their own difficulties. A picture perfect relationship may not be all it seems. Take Cheryl and former husband Ashley Cole, whose marriage infamously broke down after a cheating scandal emerged.
There’s also countless accusations of women being with footballers for their money, frequently labelled gold diggers. In Coleen Rooney’s documentary, her husband Wayne says that he always knew she was ‘different’ - ‘she knew what she wanted’, and he admired her ‘commitment’ and ‘discipline’. A BBC article recognises that ‘as soon as the young couple hit the spotlight, it was she who was seen as the lucky one. "Coleen was in a position that so many young girls of her age would dream about, being with a Premiership footballer,"' The accusations of gold digging are unfair, suggesting that the women would not be attracted to their partners without the appeal of their bank accounts, and neglecting the idea that their partners might be the ones to take an interest and pursue them, demonstrating further the lack of value wives and girlfriends possess.
Add in the online trolling and media scrutiny, and you’ve got a life that’s not all it’s cracked up to be.
The Final Score
The term WAG needs to be cancelled. It’s based entirely on sexism, a way to conveniently group women together as asides to their partners. It is confusing that the majority of society has moved on from this dated concept, whilst overtly masculine football culture insists on pushing women out, and headlines regarding WAGs still largely concentrate on their appearances and lavish lifestyles.
Some of the women have spoken out themselves regarding this, with Sasha Attwood reiterating, ‘I am my own person, I have my own life, I have two jobs, I work hard’, and Rebekah Vardy stating that ‘WAG is a dated term because we’re not defined by what our husbands do. We’re individuals’. Coleen Rooney disputes the stereotype of a WAG: ‘When you say WAG I feel like people put you in a category. It’s portrayed to be, like, out lunching, drinking champagne, shopping…there has been times where I’ve gone out for lunch and I’ve had a glass of champagne but it’s every now and again. This is my life - in the car…back and forth to school, the kids.’ These women are multi-faceted beings, just like anyone else. Their partner’s career choice doesn’t change that, and I can’t fathom why anyone would ever think it did.
Honestly, I feel as though a lot of this hate stems from jealousy or intimidation - a lot of WAGs are extremely influential and it’s correct that they didn’t have to do much to earn their platform. Equally, they didn’t choose it for themselves either. It’s a byproduct of their relationship, and they can use it how they wish to. If they want to use it to show off their great fashion sense, why not let them? If they want to show work they’re doing, why not let them? If they want to keep it all under wraps, that’s fine too! To judge and criticise any of these women, no matter how famous they are, for their relationship is just plain misogynistic. I don’t see anyone slating the male footballer for having a girlfriend or wife. I do see their partners being blamed if their husband doesn’t have a good day at work.
I want to end by reflecting on something Cochrane wrote,
‘It's not their fault – very often, the couples are childhood sweethearts who would have stayed together had he been a plumber, a plasterer or a teacher. It is the media that has chosen to describe them as Wags and define them by their marital status. But the idea is thus reinforced that women can never be heroes in their own right. If the obsession with Wags represents one thing, it's surely a means of putting women firmly back in their place.’
Above all, I feel a sense of sadness for these women. Yes, they have so many privileges in their lives - wealth, a level of influence, nice houses, the lot. I can’t help but think, however, how tiring it must be to deal with the constant hate and sexism that they do, purely because of the person they’ve fallen in love with. It’s wrong. More than just a pretty face, these women are human beings with their own minds. They’re a lot stronger than we know.
