Turnbull and Johnson with the MFC Enterprise Academy hosted a talent competition among local schools.

Boro's "Strictly Got the Euro Talent Factor - But It's Not on Ice!" was part of Creating Chances, the Premier League's flagship good causes programme.

Creating Chances is designed to showcase the vast amount of work that Boro and the other 19 Barclays Premier League clubs do in their local communities.

Organised by Boro's groundbreaking Enterprise Academy, the talent show saw talented pupils from Middlesbrough secondary schools go head to head at the Riverside Stadium.

Two of Boro's own talented youth products, goalkeeper Ross and winger Adam, were joined on the judging panel by Middlesbrough fan Alistair Griffin, who enjoyed his own piece of talent show celebrity as runner-up in Fame Academy some years ago.

They judged acts that includes the King's Academy Gospel Choir, Irish dancer Rachel Drury from Macmillan Academy and a fourstrong gymnastics team from Acklam Grange School, with King's Academy judged the winners.

The MFC Enterprise Academy has also challenged each school to produce its own promotional material for their act. Supported by funding from the Single Programme and the Premier League, the Enterprise Academy was developed in partnership between Middlesbrough Football Club, Middlesbrough Council and Stockton-on- Tees Borough Council.

It uses the football club as the model business when teaching the region's young people about business and the world of work.

The MFC Enterprise Academy has worked with over 7,000 local students so far this year and over 35,000 young people since its kick-off in 2002. It has worked with 90 per cent of schools in the Tees Valley and is now prominent with the County Durham and Yorkshire areas.

The project aims to encourage young people to think about starting up their own business and to include enterprise in their everyday lives.

The project recently received £300,000 in funding from thePremier League/PFA Community Fund,whichenables Premier League clubs to apply for grants to start innovative new projects or develop and enhance the many they already deliver.

The £12.9m three-year fund is administered and managed by the Football Foundation. Through the new funding, The Enterprise Academy is now running three new courses including a Business Enterprise Course in Newton Aycliffe Home for Young Offenders, working with students with Special Educational Needs across Teesside and teaching Gifted and Talented sixth formers.

The success of The Enterprise Academy has led to it being rolled out in other Premier League clubs, including Manchester City and Aston Villa.

Boro players have already made Creating Chances community appearances in support of Billingham's Community Integrated Care and MFC in the Community's Entry to Employment and Micro Soccer schemes, while a visit to the Middlesbrough Multiple Sclerosis Centre is also to be arranged.

Boro also chose to donate £4,000 to each of CIC, the Multiple Sclerosis Centre, the local branches of Samaritans and Guide Dogs for the Blind, plus Teesside charities, the Breakaway Children's Fund and the George Hardwick Foundation.