Shed Loads of Memories..(Chelsea Loathers Look Away Now!)
Shed Loads of Memories..(Chelsea Loathers Look Away Now!)
Blue Is The Colour..Football Is The Game
He’s Got A Shed ..And Crispin is his name!
Hi all…since I shall in all probability, never again be invited to appear in my own Shed and The Shed on TV again, I’m reprinting the BBC take on my recent now legendary(!) appearance on BBC 1 Inside Out Mon Feb 28.
Always one to blow my own and The Football Poets trumpet, ruthlessly exploiting all media forms out there, if you missed it, here it is. If you copy and visit the BBC web-link below, there are a few pics too which kind of explain it better. The film itself is a moving piece on Sheds by loyal Blues fan and film-maker Ray Hough and it went out just before Eastenders too. Thus exceeding my previous best ever Glastonbury audience* of 20,000 by millions…(*where I compered and opened for Rolf Harris in my Darth Vader helmet but that’s another well over-told story) …anyways here it is..if anyone wants to see an actual pic of me and my shed please e-mail me on editors@footballpoets.org and I’ll forward a j-peg…until i figure how to get new pics onto our totally un-funded and desperately in need of an artisic overhaul-site!
The film bit about me is based on my poem Shed (which I’ll also reprint here for the um-teenth time), and how I turned my old shed, complete with corrugated roof, into a blue and white football shrine to the original one, now demolished, at Stamford Bridge – in which i literally ‘grew up’. I am stuffing it with my memorabilia and memories. It’s also about how I do actuallty sit in it and listen to the games on Radio Five. I mean how sad is that? Anyways Auntie BBC liked the idea, my shed got a new lick of paint in the process, and they invited me up to Chelsea and also came and filmed me in it..the rest… like The Shed, is history!
PS….about my poems..getting a bit more Chelsea-ish..!?
having tried to be incredibly neutral for the last four years alongside various wonderful one-club besotted poems – I do..,as the years whizz by….and of course being top too.. find myself writing more and more about my chosen team, aided largely by having worked there recently, getting ‘back-stage’, meeting Roy Bentley etc..and getting to more games again..at last…and of course thinking about my beloved Sheds (both of em)…Enough! Sorry ! Crispin
BBC 1 WEB-SITE
Shed Of Dreams
http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/insideldn/insideout/series7/garden_sheds.shtml
“Crispin’s shed is a homage to the Stamford Bridge Shed
Poet Crispin Thomas is a self confessed sheddist and has waxed lyrical about one shed in particular.
Spending many happy afternoons under the leaky roof of The Shed at Stamford Bridge, home of Chelsea FC, Crispin wrote a poem in its honour.
“I wrote the poem about the nostalgia and the feeling that I had when I used to stand in The Shed and how I felt when they pulled it down. That place had been a refuge for so long, a gathering point where the sounds of the fans could be heard.”
It might have had a leaky roof but Crispin has fond memories
“So I thought, ‘I’m going to turn my shed into The Shed and that’s what I did!.”
TWO POEMS FOLLOW….’SHED’ & ‘IN THE MIDDLE OF THE SHED’..
am also currently working on THE BACK OF THE SHED..for really early memories..
Shed (Revisited 05)
now my nan had a shed in the garden
and the bloke down the road’s got one too
but there was a shed that i lived in for years
it was magic and rusty and blue
and the iron was all corrugated
the rooftop was leaky and old
you got soaked to the skin when the rain came in
but the Shed at the Bridge had soul
and we clapped underneath with the faithful
and the skinheads much later on
and the endless fat blokes with their bugles
how the memories go on and on
being squashed in like sardines at cup-ties
when most of the crowd were all ‘pissed’
when they moved to and fro you just had to let go
it was crazy to try to resist
it was epic and concrete and awesome
sixty eight thousand or so
i got passed down the front on the hands of the crowd
to watch Greavesie get five in a row
but when tragedy struck we all realised
at Bradford and Hillsborough we knew
that nothing’s as precious as this life itself
and the days of the Shed grew few
so i put up a shed in my garden-
got my memories and dreams in there too
and i go in there now to remember
in my own shed all painted and blue
yes i go in there now to remember on weekends with Radio Five
and i think to myself as i stand in my shed
i’m the luckiest Blues fan alive
cos i don’t have no nice numbered seating
no that ain’t a part of my dream
cos there’s something strange about having to sit
when you wanna stand up for your team
and I’m left with my shed in my garden
and the bloke down the road’s got one too
but there was a shed that i lived in for years
it was magic and rusty and blue
and the iron was all corrugated
and the rooftop was leaky and old
you got soaked to the skin when the rain came in
but the Shed at the Bridge had soul
© Crispin Thomas 2000
——————————————————————————–
In The Middle Of The Shed
on nights like this the heart returns
to where our passioned hearts would burn
along that heaving Fulham Road
to where the floodlights loomed and glowed –
the push and shove before those gates
in frantic cup-tie queues and waits
that snaked through streets for miles and miles
to squeeze at last through old turnstiles
and climb those steps to claim our place
that magic concrete sacred space
where you and I on dreams were fed
within the middle of The Shed –
how different then the atmosphere
when we would stand and roar and cheer
and yell and bay for hours and hours
as though empowered with super-powers
where you and I both old and young
were crammed so tight and sung and sung
those anthem songs in anarchy
so famous in our loyalty
away away to every ground
we bathed thoses terraces in sound
from Geoffrey to the CFC
wherever you or I would be
we carried hopes with hearts of stone
like snails our corrugated home
and jumped and leapt and screamed on high
until our voices all ran dry
when relegation hung like thread
within the middle of The Shed –
an hour or so before each game
we’d meet to lift the vibe again
and raise our hopes to one day see
success from mediocrity
but often never knew or saw
exactly who had missed or scored
when hopes would fly at fever pitch
the underdogs against the rich
where instant wit and jokes combined
to quell those butterflies inside
that to this day will still remain
in nevousness before each game
to banish ridicule and scorn
that lingered since this club was born
to reach these current dizzy heights
and Euro glory heartstop nights
we stood and stretched above the heads
within the middle of The Shed
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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