Football Poets

Sponsored friendly games

¶ 1 Leave a comment on verse 1 0 You must remember the
Frisson of anticipation
Football once again
Feverish always
Champing at the bit
Longing for its quaintness
The Texaco Cup, the Watney Cup
Football’s pre-season frivolity
The games that may have passed
Over our heads
But were just there
Ludicrous in their
Insignificance
Rather like training ground
Exercises without any point
Or purpose
Tacked onto the end of summer
Like the fading breezes
That once stiffened our sinews
And heightened the senses
For opening day of the season
Contests of football’s August
First chapter and
Level playing grounds
The Watney Cup
Questions abound
As to origin and provenance
Football briefly under the influence
Of alcohol but somehow
Unconnected to anything in particular
Nothing concrete, almost abstract
Important for those who were concerned
But never registering on anybody’s radar
A convenient excuse
For footballers to stretch calves and legs
Top up the swarthy holiday tan
Gingerly tickle football’s funny bone
Tentative introductions to a football
After a three month hiatus
Hop, skip and jump
Keepie up indulgences
Your weekly heroes
Have still got it you know
No ring rust there
But have they got a Texaco Cup
Winners medal in their cupboard?
Surely a glaring omission
The oil and petrol of their lives
Or some such accolade
Then there was the Watney Cup
From whom none of us can imagine why
It ever existed
Then there was the Anglo Italian Cup,
The Makita Cup and then
During football term time
The Zenith Data Systems Cup,
The Sinod Cup, the Milk Cup,
The Littlewoods Cup
Football shaking hands with
Rampant commercialism
Eyes lighting up with wads
Of delirious cash
But then we giggled at
Its summery futility
Or maybe not
Oh football so friendly
To one and all.

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