Football Poets

In the Quarry Bank lunch hour, I play footie
with Andy, Garth, and Billy Lynch.
We lay our blazers down for goalposts
on the grass near Calderstones mansion.
A mongrel runs up, pauses, and pees
on a blazer. […]

The proud history of the F.A. Cup’s besmirched
when Premier League clubs put out their reserve side,
–with results to match. . . now who’s surprised?
Manchester United reserves Nil, Exeter amateurs Nil!

Sir Alex […]

Football Cairn, a bunch of ancient stones at the summit
of a Northumberland hill pinkly covered with heather,
a hefty climb to see the prehistoric cup and ring markings.
But I bet no one ever played footie here […]

‘”Football Lexicon” …. the best thing I have EVER read
on the relationship between language and football.
A Fowler type guide to football discourse -‘

Robbie Fowler has written a Lexicon?
Now THIS I have to […]

might have been fitted in somehow after all
down at the Pier Head, don’t you think? Recall
the architect’s design that called for it to look
like a deflated old football of brown leather

straight from Daisy in […]

A “waterlogged pitch” so they say
and I wuz all ready to follow the action
on my computer gamecast, like me owld Grandad
in the stands or watching on telly, his legs jiggling
as if he was right there on the pitch […]

I worked down at the old Wapping Dock Warehouse,
clerking for the Mersey Docks and Harbor Board,
clocking the ships in and out, the banana boats
from Guatemala, the Guinness boats from Dublin,
ships from Brazil […]

Emblazoned on my Sixties bedroom wall:
Bond, coolly suave with Beretta in hand;
Jane Fonda, breasts bulging as Barbarella;
Zappa and Hendrix, hairy guys with phallic-
necked guitars. I daubed my walls […]

Pick up the ball, la’, in the penalty area
and us playin’ at West Brom in the Cup!
“I thought I heard the Ref’s wee whistle.”

Nah, t’wasn’t that, Ron: it wuz some Baggie
whistling in the crowd! Any team in […]

I. The Saint

The Saint headed it in, and I don’t know how he did,
the photos showed him horizontal, flying in midair
in the Leeds area, his characteristic cropped head,
in extra time to win us that first FA Cup, […]

“Some o’them wudden know the way to the Pier ‘ead,”
the old-time fan grouses about our new crew: a Czech,
a Norwegian, a German, several Spaniards, a Finn. . . .

True, it’s not like the old days with all the […]

At Anfield for a reserves match,
we arrive in the club car park
in Uncle Bruce’s old black Ford Prefect.
We freeze in the empty stands till
half time, and the special treat:
mugs of tea laced with Johnnie […]