THE FOOTBALL BATTALION... (My new poem inspired by a WW1 recruitment poster...)

 The Football Battalion…

(Inspired by a World War 1 recruitment poster…)

It wasn’t as if playing professional football was a reserved

Occupation, like teaching, mining, being a doctor, working 

On the railways, farming the land, or toiling in munitions.

Yet somehow, players became the subject of a propaganda story

By the Frankfurter Zeitung newspaper, which observed

That the English footballers’ long limbs were irresponsibly shirking

By playing soccer, rather than exposing themselves to the attrition

Of warfare in their country’s service, where survival would be the true glory…

So it was, that the 17th Middlesex Battalion was created

For players to join and fight for their country, alongside

Supporters of their teams, who enlisted too and were elated

To be comrades with their heroes, role models to take up arms beside…

Pete Ray…

30th December 2025…

There was some indignation in 1914 that the football league was intending to continue, even as the Expeditionary Force was involved in fierce fighting in France.

So, other than the German newspaper propaganda mentioned about, there was also a public clamour for football to halted.

Interesting though, that no such clamour was made to halt horse racing, something that King George V attended regularly…

Dog racing, rabbit coursing and boxing were known to have continued for a time, too…