Football Poets

England against Malta

¶ 1 Leave a comment on verse 1 0 We watched the paint dry
Dripping with coats
Of emulsion creamy
As insipid white
England paling
Into insignificance
Awful as the
Dullest wallpaper
And to think
That over 80,000 paid
For the privilege
More of an outright imposition
If truth be told
Having teeth pulled
Agony disguised as
Unbearable purgatory
The penultimate Euro
Qualifier
England and Malta
Please never again
Horrible as sour milk
Or hard bread
The worst of all offerings
In future
We’d much prefer
An antiquated BBC
Test card from
Yesteryear
Regardless of
The dentist waiting room
Music
And the girl smiling
At the most hilarious
Game of noughts and crosses
With the green puppet
Who much preferred a game
Of chess, far simpler
Or maybe not
Football needed a cut off
Point last night
A marked line in the sand
England through to the Euros
In Germany next summer
Enough said
The Maltese Falcon
Surplus to requirements
Last night
No more recollections
Of Dom Mintoff
From many generations ago
It felt like a leisurely
Five a side kickabout
Against a backdrop
Of imposing council estate
Flats or next to the recycling
Plants next door to
Uncle Dom
Coincidentally
Wearing the white of
England but seeing red
Last night
Only 2-0 to England
How totally unsatisfactory
In Germany certainly
Inadequate, never
What the doctor might
Have ordered
Just not good enough
As Dion Dublin among
The cloisters and colleges
Of Cambridge
And mighty Manchester United
Told us last night
It almost felt as if
England were playing
In permanent first gear
Without ever releasing
The handbrake
Or just under the influence
Of far too many sleeping pills
Completely knocked out
Indulging in private, confidential
Huddles of neat, safe short passes
Why this veil of secrecy
Gareth Southgate?
This clandestine operation
Backwards, sideways and forwards
Only to regress, progress
And then a change of heart
Back to the original plan
Meaningless Wembley wanderings
In a torpid trance
Since when does football have to
Be this tentative exercise?
In 90 minutes of caution
And settling for small pickings
This was painfully slow
Slower than slow motion
Those joyous Match of the Day
Replays when John and Barry
Would analyse the game
In its finest detail
But they were purists of
The game
Impartial observers
And yet what on earth
Would they have made
Of last night’s
Dress rehearsal
For Germany
Surely not
Otherwise punishments
Will be rightly
Administered by Germany,
France, Spain,
Italy almost certainly now
There were crabs rather than
Paper planes on the pitch
Against Malta
We may have seen
Faster tortoises
England almost drained
Lifeless, withdrawn
Haggard and weather beaten
Totally indifferent
And wishing they were in the
Land of foaming lagers
And amber nectar beers
Where Teutonic efficiency
Rules the roost
No stones left unturned
For what it matters
Pepe an own goal
1-0 to England
And one magical blur
Of one two passes
Before Citizen Kane
Passes the ball home
For the second goal
Harry boy of Bayern
Munich will hope for
Yet more German ironies
In the summer of the
Euros cavalcade of
Football fun
Now here’s a warning
England
A repetition of last
Night may end
With dire consequences
A quick plane journey
Back to Blighty
No trophy, no show
And only memories
Of muddled tactics
Naivete and oh
No!
England still a work
In progress
Under construction
So much work to do

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