0021 Football's New Rules Poem by Michael Shepherd

I guess you read the news
about the town – soon to be copied –
which abolished traffic lights...
what happened? Self-preservation,
care, and courtesy have won the day..

while the soccer news this weekend was
that everybody blames the referee..
who’s after all, just the traffic-lights to this game..
suppose we tried the same daring system on the soccer field..

any player who makes a bad tackle
or an inadvertent trip (deliberate ones
would disappear as a mark of shame)
to apologise politely and offer
a free kick to the other side..

the player who kicks the ball into touch
immediately hands the ball to the other side
or at the very least, runs away – both sides
always knowing very well who touched it last..

shirt-pulling and diving would be
such matters of shame that the player’s
own side would stop playing and remain
rooted to the spot until
the culprit offered a free kick..

and any really doubtful events would be referred
to the television cameras for a quick decision;
and all the players might just feel the urge
to applaud and clap a tricky moment fairly resolved?

and at the end of the match,
the players would line up and just like
an international does at the beginning,
shake hands down the line…

while the managers would meet symbolically at centre-pitch,
shake hands publicly on a game cleanly fought,
and even – full on camera – look each other
in the eye..

and we the supporters would feel damn proud
that sport was sport once again, that
football was and is the life-blood of the nation,
and if not more important than life and death
at least a happy occasion of skills enjoyed..

and that, win or lose, chivalry and
the game’s the thing..