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Poems tagged ‘football legend’

Peter Drury- football poet

joe morris

Friday, February 27th, 2026

Peter Drury, Peter Drury
Let your rivers of
Golden prose
Wax lyrical
Through the tides and tempests
Of the Beautiful Game
A soothing antidote
To the hectic hustle and bustle
Through Premier League muscle
Where words danced on your lips
And then a thousand eloquent quips
And everything was refined
It was never a bind
A ray of sunshine
Always on time
Statesmanlike, on elegant mic
Like birds of tropical hue
And the colour was blue
Chelsea is their name
Guaranteed fame, your words
Are like sparkling jewels
By royal appointment it seemed
They beamed and gleamed
Dripping like the sweetest honey
Right on the money
When VAR seemed like the last resort
Time for deliberation and thought
Peter Drury comforted us all
We’re always in thrall
Renowned poet on TV’s most
Authoritative screens
Finely woven patterns
The loveliest of sheens
A wistful nod to the past
And present,
Goals came and went
Said once from the
David Coleman treasure troves
Amid the shining groves of
Football’s intellectual themes
But Peter Drury
Carved a sonnet or two
A masterful coup
An interview with the best
North, South, East and West
To football’s rich tapestry
An engaging bon mots
He always showed
And forever glowed
A clean pair of heels
On football’s giddiest wheels
The height of footballing’s
Greatest fairs
He was and is there
Where trophies were won
Without a care
You found silk where
And then embroidery too
But never boo
The great Peter Drury
Because he does it just
Perfectly, aptly
Never short of the right
Phrase, but never fazed,
Spun in the fields
The finest wheat
Where you too
Found football’s heartbeat
You continue to find
Vivacious verse
On winding roads
You traverse
On neatly stitched
Green pitches
More and more please
Peter Drury
Please do take a bow
You learned scholar
And erudite follower
Of football’s finest
Dictionaries, a
Metaphor or simile
The lexicon of truth
Peter Drury
We salute you, sir
At the hallowed portals
Of immortals
And gates of knowledge
Where the Premier League forages
For your pearls of wisdom
At the Emirates, Etihad,
Anfield,
The Hill Dickinson too
Peter Drury master of your craft
In the heat of the graft
Where toil and drudgery
You discovered
Skill and skulduggery
At the feet of the
Premier League without defeat
Peter Drury for Prime Minister
We kid you not.

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Hackney Marshes

joe morris

Saturday, December 13th, 2025

Oh Hackney Marshes
Surely the birthplace of
Sunday football
Where the first cries
And screams of wholesome
Proper football made
Its first team entrance
The boggy marshlands
Of wintry nine or ten
Goal thrillers
The boys who retire
To their local boozer
A magical microcosm
Of dear old England
How we love the
Vast diversity of
Man on, down the line mate.
Thousands of posts and crossbars
A mass confusion of VARs
And yet they never take this seriously
Football’s grassroots
Where men and women in thick
Sheepskin coats, stand stoically
In all seasons
Like statues both old and young
On barely visible touchlines
Yelling, pleading, feeling,
Too emotional and sensitive
Breathing choice and vitriolic
Words of purple profanity
But don’t tell mum and dad
They had standards and values
And so do we
Football on Hackney Marshes
Played the game until midnight
If they had their way
Just for the fun of it
And yet they do believe
In the fiery furnaces of competition
Linking daisy chains of passes in muddy
Minefields of midfield
Overlapping cavalry charges
Down laughingly invisible wings
On me head, son or daughter now
That insistence on effort
100 per cent of commitment
Even though it may be a
Hackney Marshes eleven
Against the lads from
The local electricity board
Or the tireless farmers
Who send combine harvesters
Over vibrant village grounds
Hackney Marshes
This is where football
May have been born

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Trevor Francis

joe morris

Monday, July 24th, 2023

Shocked to the core
Trevor Francis
An England legend now
Passes into historic lore
Sadly no longer with us
At 69, tragically young
A gentleman through
And through
Above the decadence
Of the nightclub circuit
A 16-year old goal scorer
Supreme, honest as the day
Is long. Dedicated to his
Craft, a career
Chiselled with tools of the
Finest craftsmanship
A Brummie at first
With Birmingham blood
In his veins
Scoring from every
Hypotenuse
Goals from the
Most learned
Pythagoras Theorem
Thunderous drives,
Natural poacher
And trusty landowner
In hectic penalty areas
This was his domain
His football fiefdom
Then Cloughie came calling
And none ever hesitated
When Brian Clough was
In the vicinity of victory
The first million pound player
Forest memorably illuminated
By the shining torch
Of the Midas Francis touch
Swooping to head in against
Malmo in one European Cup Final
And then another winners medal against Hamburg
Injured but undaunted
It was so complete, so heartening
Uplifting to the soul
Briefly at QRR, Rangers of Glasgow
And Sheffield Wednesday for a while
But then in latter years
The respect of his contemporaries
No longer though
The powerful force of old
Although always championing
The new and upcoming
Trevor Francis
We salute you

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Farewell Dec

joe morris

Saturday, July 15th, 2023

So farewell Dec
We knew the day
Would arrive
Where once trod
The educated feet
Of Bobby and Billy
And now your good self
Firstly we were privileged
To witness the fabled
Mooro and Bonzo who once
Graced the hallowed turf
Of Upton Park
Where bubbles floated
In perpetuity
But now
Parting is such
Sweet sorrow
Rather than obvious
Cliche
Absence will indeed
Make the heart grow
Fonder
A repetition of cliches
You must forgive us
Oh watch the dam burst
With tributaries of tears
Since the age of 14
Where the Bridge of Sighs
Must have taken the deepest
Of breath
Chelsea in the mists of history
But then properly
And judiciously your
Sat nav transported you
To East End palaces
West Ham, now engraved
In your soul
Claret and blue
With distinction and honour
It was back in June
When the last valedictory
Gestures were made
Goodbye Declan
We’ll miss your literary
Knowledge of the game,
Reading studiously
In the West Ham academy
Of academies
First class university
Of life. A 2:1 degree
UEFA Conference League
Winners medal to boot
The platform is there
For you at the Emirates
Where next season
Your loyal Hammers fans
Will shower you with
Praise and flattery,
An abundance of approbation
You will never ever be
Forgotten along forgotten
Country lanes
For London was always calling
Now East heads North
Dec, a Gooner now
Signed and sealed, underlined
But you’ll always be one
Of ours
Declan Rice
We wish you well
Our friend of the
All embracing community
Of the London Stadium parish
The red carpet of rapturous
Reception
Next season
You’ll always be welcomed
Like royalty
Forever more

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Source: https://footballpoets.org/news/poem-tags/football-legend/