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The Offside Rule

by  Mickey

Posted: Friday, September 30, 2016
Word Count: 98
Summary: I am a trustee of Haywards Heath Town FC and, this year was considering including a fortnightly poem in each home game match day programme under the general heading of ‘The Half Time Rhyme’ I thought I ought to at least include one piece about the beautiful game




To read the Egyptian hieroglyphs
they had the Rosetta Stone,
but try to decipher the offside rule
and you’re on your bloody own!
Up until 1866, ‘goal-hanging’ had been okay,
then the FA amended the Sheffield Rules
to the system we play today.
The boys at the top in their blazers and suits
don’t have to endure all the touchline disputes -
Had the player run back from an offside position?
or whether the linesman’s cocked-up the decision.
But from Berwick to Bournemouth
the rules are the same
and the vexed Law Eleven’s
all part of the game