Sporty People Poem by Wendy Cope

Sporty People

Rating: 3.3


I took her for my kind of person
And it was something of a shock
When my new friend revealed
That, once upon a time,
She was a Junior County Tennis Champion.

How could that happen?
How could I accidentally
Make friends with a tennis champion?
How could a tennis champion

Make friends with me?

She wasn't stupid. She read books.
She had never been mean to me
For being bad at games.
I decided to forgive
Her unfortunate past.

Sporty people can be OK -
Of course they can.
Later on, I met poets
Who played football. It's still hard
To get my head round that.

Wednesday, June 24, 2015
Topic(s) of this poem: sports
COMMENTS OF THE POEM
Kevin Patrick 12 February 2016

Ha! Im taken Mrs Cope is writing in jest, not all athletes are prigs, not all poets are sweet. Would have loved to see what she thought of golfing, aka the most boring game invented by man

1 7 Reply
Vihaan Talegaonkar 09 April 2020

The poet believes that sporty people shouldn't be studios and she stereotypes them to be mean and blame her for their losses. But when she gets to know that her friend was a tennis champion and meets some footballers who are poets, she changes her opinion on sporty people and starts to respect them.

3 0 Reply
Addya Nayak 08 April 2020

People have different traits and unpredictable qualities about them. They can be

0 1 Reply
Alan D 01 February 2019

Some poems are intelligible, and some poets are popular and the poetry establishment should get used to it.

0 1 Reply
ANVIKA 08 April 2020

The poem is witty and reveals that never judge a book by its cover. Never to be judgemental.

0 0 Reply
Hsiw 27 April 2021

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0 0 Reply
Aahana Shinde 7C 12 April 2020

The poet was amused when she learnt that her new friend was a tennis champion who was equally good at studies.The poet wonders that how can a sports person be so serious about reading books. Later on she also met a poet who played football. This changed the poets opinion about a person that a person can excel both in academics and other activities at the same time.

1 0 Reply
Arya Botadra 10 April 2020

So, the poet thinks and assumes that the people who play sports cannot be good at studies which is a form of stereotyping and it is not good to judge people according to the past or background.She has a friend but she doesn't know that she is a champion in tennis.She thinks that her friend is exactly like her but when she gets to know that she plays a sport and she is very good at it, she starts to judge her which is not good at all.So shortly we get to know that the poet is a nerd.

1 0 Reply
Krishna patel 09 April 2020

Well, the poet believes that people who r good at sports can’t be a nerd or a studios but in reality there are people like that too, in fact I have friend who is good at both.

0 0 Reply
Avika Lakhani 09 April 2020

The poet believes that sporty people cannot be good at studies while they can be good at it she gets to know this with an example that is her own friend. She realizes that she was wrong to judge people like that

2 0 Reply
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