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The Sacking

Dan Stathers

Sunday, February 4th, 2018

1 Leave a comment on verse 1 3 Crabbed in his concrete bunker
watching the bad go to worse,
‘the gaffer’ draws on his last cigarette,
wincing as his name is barracked down
tiers and jeered along terraces,
his fate knotted in a walnut boardroom
signed in a cigar’s smoke.

2 Leave a comment on verse 2 0 The Mediterranean lad,
his unpronounceable six-figure hope,
makes a last-ditch, floodlit
sally into the penalty box,
flashes his quiffy brilliance
then flops on the greasy acreage
to land in a puddle of Bovril and boos.

3 Leave a comment on verse 3 0 The game is up.

4 Leave a comment on verse 4 0 He straightens his barber striped tie
and fronts the rabid mob,
posturing their middle fingers
and preaching tomorrow’s headlines.

5 Leave a comment on verse 5 0 The hacks sharpen their leads
and the emptying stadium gurgles
as he feeds them his soliloquy:

6 Leave a comment on verse 6 0 something rotten in the state of Scunthorpe.

Notes

A satirical poem about a bygone age of smoking managers, dilapidated stadiums, baying fans and miserable midweek matches. The reference to Scunthorpe Utd is purely poetic.

Source: http://footballpoets.org/poems/the-sacking/