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London Football Just After The War.

1 Leave a comment on verse 1 0 Why not go to Highbury, or maybe White Hart Lane?
All we want is ten woodbines and a mac to keep out the rain
Their shorts reach down to the kneecap, brown leather up to the calf
Do you think they’ll play without shinguards in?, nobody’s that daft!

2 Leave a comment on verse 2 0 As the floodlights shone down upon rows of brylcreemed heads
It was ‘standing room only’ at each ground, in days before the Ted’s!
It’s no go to a rattle, with its noise of clack, clack, clack
All we want is our bus fare and a ticket to the match

3 Leave a comment on verse 3 0 Why not go to Brisbane Road, or maybe Upton Park
Then of course, if you travel North, you set off when its dark

4 Leave a comment on verse 4 0 As Bastin, Ramsey, Hapgood return to fields of green
War is over. The working mans game is high in our esteem
It’s no go to Palestine, No go to the Suez Canal
All we want is Wemberley and an FA Cup Final

5 Leave a comment on verse 5 0 As laced up balls of leather, that when sodden, felt like lead
Hit the net, no one forgets, The War, The Blitz, The Dead
But it helps to make it easier, to take the mind of things
As normality comes rolling down the road to shout, to cheer, to sing

6 Leave a comment on verse 6 0 Why not go to Craven Cottage, or maybe Stamford Bridge
Every Saturday is when they played, Sunday? Sacrilege

7 Leave a comment on verse 7 0 As 50 or 60 thousand fans are in attendance at each game
Working class hero’s to a fan, knew all their idols names
As rosettes, scarves and bobble hats make each turnstile click
‘ Can the kids get in for nothing’? ‘Pass them over then, be quick’!

8 Leave a comment on verse 8 0 As glad rags replace sandbags, the atmosphere is electric
Goodbye to nights down the underground, such times, were always hectic
As Saturday comes with expectancy, hope, despair, perhaps?
This is it, the perfect fit, the all, the game, the match.

9 Leave a comment on verse 9 0 Why not go to Loftus Road, or maybe Griffin Park
This is London football, just after the war
It’s verve, it’s sport, it’s spark!

10 Leave a comment on verse 10 0 With sincere apologies to the late great Louis Macneice, on whose cracking poem Bagpipe Music, the style of this poem is based.

11 Leave a comment on verse 11 0 peace.

Notes

With very sincere apologies to the late great Louis Macneice, on whose cracking poem Bagpipe Music, the style of this poem is based.

peace.

kev

Source: http://footballpoets.org/poems/london-football-just-after-the-war/?shared=email&msg=fail