The regional winner for the North West in the Premier League Writing Stars competition has been announced.

Matilda ,8, from Smallwood Church of England Primary School, was presented with a framed version of her winning poem by representatives from Crewe Alexandra.

Premier League Writing Stars is a poetry competition open to pupils from all primary schools in England and Wales. The competition is delivered as part of the Premier League Primary Stars programme.

The winning poem was selected by an all-star judging panel, which featured former professional footballer and children’s author Frank Lampard OBE, Premier League footballer and lyricist Yannick Bolasie, Children’s Laureate Lauren Child and the young people’s laureate for London Caleb Femi and overseen by Jonathan Douglas, the National Literacy Trust Director.

Commenting on Matilda’s poem, Caleb Femi said: “Matilda’s poem was technically fantastic, I’ve really enjoyed her structure and also, I got a huge sense of inspiration and motivation by reading her poem. She really was able to capture this sense of resilience, which was exactly what we were looking for.”

The winning poems will now be published in a special Writing Stars poetry book due to be released later this year. Other prizes include author-led writing workshops and Premier League trophy school visits, as well as winning poems being read aloud by football stars.

Frank Lampard said: “It’s been very tough to pick winners out of more than 25,000 entries. It’s been a great experience for me trying to read through the lot of them and find winners when it’s such a high standard.

“It’s been a great competition and we’ve seen a lot of quality. Congratulations to all the winners but congratulations to everybody who took part.”

Richard Scudamore, executive chairman at the Premier League, added: “We have been overwhelmed by the volume and standard of entries for the Premier League Writing Stars competition.

“Our aim was to inspire children to write creatively about resilience, and the response, thanks to the support of clubs, schools and teachers, has completely surpassed our expectations.

“Congratulations to all the regional and national winners for their outstanding poems.”