Four teenagers who will be representing Britain in an international robotics competition received a visit from Barnet’s mayor yesterday afternoon.

Shervin Sabeghi, 14, Riku Murai, 14, Nikunj Pindoriya, 15, and Vinesh Khetani, 15, from Christ’s College School, in East End Road, Finchley, entered a robot they made into RoboCupJunior and won the national finals.

As a result they have now been invited to represent the UK in the RoboCup World Championships in Mexico City from June 18 to June 23.

To mark this achievement Barnet’s new mayor, Cllr Brian Schama, paid the boys a visit.

The competition, which was founded in 1997, aims to promote robotics research by offering an appealing challenge to young people.

It requires teams to create robots which can play football, dance and carry out rescues.

The boys got involved in robotics after joining a club at school.

The club, which is run by science teacher, Adrian Terruli, gave the students an opportunity to build and programme LEGO robots.

Mr Terruli said: "It was nice for the boys to meet the new mayor. It made it feel more real to us."