Greg Freeman
@gregoryfreeman
Active 5 days, 7 hours ago-
Greg Freeman posted an update 5 days, 7 hours ago
To misquote Larkin, but only slightly: “We must be kind / before it’s full-time.”
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Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 5 months, 2 weeks ago
“Perhaps we are all wrong,
and Southgate
is a substitution genius.”The Facebook banter
after the England game
moves into the realm
of long-ago memory
as we talk of previous
footballing magic […] -
Greg Freeman‘s profile was updated 6 months, 3 weeks ago
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Greg Freeman commented on a poem on Football Poets 1 year, 1 month ago
Ashington FC have launched a £50,000 Crowdfunder appeal to meet the increased costs of winning promotion last season, to pay for urgent stadium improvements, travel costs and equipment
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Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 1 year, 2 months ago
Thunderous shooting that transcended his era.
Maybe you have to be a certain age.
When they announced it during the game
the crowd of six hundred
barely reacted. No gasps or murmurs.
My son shrugged, […] -
Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 1 year, 2 months ago
Uh-oh. The world’s gone pear-shaped.
I have a feeling that I’m close to home,
or at least the train. Too old for this
malarkey. Was doing so well. Now
I’m all over the place, lost count,
head swimming. This […] -
Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 1 year, 4 months ago
One hundred thousand,
at least, for a friendly.
The Russians were
still our friends, weren’t they?
November 1945.
So many servicemen
back from the warhungry to watch football again.
A photo s […] -
Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 1 year, 4 months ago
A lone bugler occasionally
blasts out the right note.
Maybe also the source
of the odd native American
war cry. The few hundred at Ashington
are passionate in their support.Proud mining town, home
of […] -
Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 1 year, 5 months ago
Jack, always the town planner,
is interested in the wind turbine
that can be seen from the ground
as well as the old terrace houses,
and fatalistic about the enormous
estate pub boarded up
for more than a […] -
Greg Freeman commented on a poem on Football Poets 2 years, 4 months ago
To put it politely!
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Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 2 years, 4 months ago
Greyhound track that separated
us from our idols. Banging
the corrugated back of the Shed.
Boys’ turnstile. Rosettes, rattles,
hot dog sellers, trains that rumbled
behind the North Stand.One of the b […]
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Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 2 years, 4 months ago
Ancient Chinese proverb:
one football fan’s
never-to-be-forgotten
victory is another’s
hardest-to-swallow defeat. -
Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 2 years, 4 months ago
Always a lovely song
that plucked at the heartstrings.
But over the years it took on
a melancholy, mournful note.
So many disappointments,
hands of God, penalty shoot-outs,
racist abuse on social […] -
Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 2 years, 5 months ago
Remember Brian Glover in Kes? The teacher
imagining he’s Bobby Charlton, United v Spurs?
This bloke was something similar.Me and my brother were drinking
at the Spanish campsite pool bar. He told u […] -
Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 2 years, 5 months ago
Parade of the pony-tails.
No wrestling in the box;
getting up and getting on with it.
Football as it should be played.Showing the men how to entertain,
putting them to shame.
The spirit of sport. […] -
Greg Freeman commented on a poem on Football Poets 2 years, 5 months ago
I remember Tony Dorigo! Australian full back. Scored the only goal for Chelsea in the Full Members Cup Final v Middlesbrough in 1990 (had to check Google). By pure chance I had a ticket for the press box. […]
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Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 2 years, 6 months ago
Never really knew my mother’s father.
All I remember: tuft of nostril hair,
spied from sitting on his knee; hoard
of half-hidden threepenny pieces
slipped into a sandpit outside the lido.In pictures he l […]
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Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 2 years, 9 months ago
‘Some people think that football
is a matter of life and death …’I was a Chelsea supporter
for 40 years before
the Roman empire.Fan is short for fanatic.
Empires fall. Football’s
nowhere near
as […] -
Greg Freeman‘s profile was updated 2 years, 9 months ago
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Greg Freeman published a poem on the site Football Poets 2 years, 9 months ago
The early April afternoon was glorious.
The daffs were out, I felt Wordsworthian.
You’d come down from York to look
at houses. We caroused that evening
with old friends in the Railway Tavern – […]
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About This Site
Welcome to Football Poets -- a club for all football poets, lovers of football and lovers of (alternative) poetry. Discover poets in every league from respected internationals at the top of their game to young hopefuls in the school playground.
Publish your football poems here and then discuss them with your team mates and fans. We're archived by The British Library, so your masterpieces are in the safe hands of a world-class keeper. What a result!
My Account
Latest Poems
John Gilbert Ellis
28th November 2024
joe morris
26th November 2024
Denys E. W. Jones
26th November 2024
Gacina Bozidar
26th November 2024
Wynn Wheldon
26th November 2024
joe morris
17th November 2024
Crispin Thomas
17th November 2024
kevin halls
10th November 2024
joe morris
10th November 2024
Clik The Mouse
10th November 2024
Crispin’s Corner
In Memoriam
Kick It Out & Christmas Truce
Latest Comments
27th November 2024 at 5:55 am
‘You’re Supposed To Be At Home’ is an excellent and moving poem Denys.
You start off thinking it’s just about another oft-sung chant, one we personally heard a lot last season throughout our second relegation in a row here at Forest Green(FGR) ! I always love poems where you think they are saying one thing and then they suddenly pull you deeper to somewhere or something else else.
I’m currently helping in a local school for FGR in a voluntary capacity using football to help young students with reading. At an upcoming session we will tackle racism, just like we did in workshops at football schools and grounds when we first started this site 24 years ago. I’m gonna try and weave your poem into a session.
We’ve added it to the Anti- Racism/Kick It Out section under Crispin’s Corner.
Best C
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26th November 2024 at 1:59 pm
Great poem and great to see you back Wyn.
Don’t leave it so long next time my friend!
More please.
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13th September 2024 at 6:14 pm
Welcome to Football Poets Beth
Great evocative poem Beth….
More please !
Haiku always welcome.
Hope we (FGR) get to play you again soon
Best
Crispin
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26th July 2024 at 6:25 pm
Great poem Mike Bartram. Eddie was a legend, affectionately known in Liverpool as, “the first hooligan.” Even the hoolies were well dressed in those days. The amazing thing was he was only 26 when that picture was taken. He’d played for Everton youth team and was well known to the players. He never got arrested. They threw him out and he climbed back in, just in time for Derek Temples winner.
I used the picture of him being tackled to the ground on the front cover of my book, “Once Upon a rhyme in Football.” It’s worth looking on youtube and finding the re-enactment of the Wembley scene. Frank Skinner and Baddiel went around to Eddies home in the 1990’s and acted it out on the green outside. It’s hilarious, especially all the effort they put in to get Eddie sober enough to shoot the scene.
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10th July 2024 at 6:07 pm
Hi Crispin,
I don’t know if you’ve see the picture in social media today…
a picture of a teenage Lionel Messi cradling a baby in Africa as part of a photoshoot…. the family had won a lottery to have their baby pictured with him….
the photographer has just revealed that the baby is actually in fact Lamine Yamal!!!!
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26th May 2024 at 2:30 pm
Hi Denys…
Re Man City:
OK it was 20 years ago but Criag Wilson did write this and a few others on them back in 04/05.
BTW I’m more Forest Green Rover since 2014 (and Chelsea) these days . I drum and am a standing season ticket holder .
Best
Crispin
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29th April 2024 at 2:47 pm
Hi Denys,
Yes Richard Williams you’re a brilliant wordsmith, my friend. When I first saw your football poetry I thought it was the superb Guardian sports and music writer. I once had the honour of sitting next to Richard Williams while at the Independent on the sports desk. He writes about music and sport with immense knowledge and authority. I’ve read a couple of Richard’s books recently. Great writer rather like you Richard Williams the Pompey fan. Congratulations on promotion.
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28th April 2024 at 5:59 pm
Thanks Denys. Yes your replay poem was superb.
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26th April 2024 at 4:46 pm
Nice work, Joe. You were quick off the mark with that! Good one from Richard Williams too I see.
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25th April 2024 at 7:33 pm
Hi Denys,
Thanks mate. I’ll do it now.
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