If you can keep your head while the stadium announcer loses theirs and screams like a child that the players are in the tunnel
If you can trust yourself when all men say VAR is a good thing,
But make allowance for their ignorance, too
If you can wait for the interminable presentation of the players entering the field, and not be tired of waiting,
Or being patronised by the 'match host' on the touchline, don't deal in hiring a sniper
Or being mugged off by your club, the Premier League, UEFA, don't give way to bullying
And yet don't get above your station, and tolerate the pantomime reading of the team line up:
If you can fantasise about safe standing - but still understand there's no money in it so won't happen in the Premier League
If you can think - and not let Alan Shearer be your master
If you can meet with the elation of bitter rivals' not winning the big European trophy and starting all over again in the Mickey Mouse Marathon
And Treat those two impostors exactly the same
If you can bear to hear the chant you've just joined in - the one with the Billy Ray Cyrus tune -
Twisted by numpties to make a trap for those who should know better
Or watch the team you gave your life to, broken in Baku
And yet only a few weeks later, sing that they are By Far The Greatest Team The World Has Ever Seen
If you can make one heap of all the savings you've made not renewing your Sky Sports' subscription
And risk it on one turn of weak resistance
And lose, and give it all to Murdoch
And never tell the other half about your doubts
If you can abandon your conscience, and put the match before the kids' bedtime routine
To serve your turn long after your partner has left the house in disgust
And so hold on when there is nothing left in you
Except the will to say "More live matches than ever before!"
If you can speak your own mind, and not let Adrian Durham get in your head
Or get tickets in the Wembley corporate section, and don't stay in the bar ten minutes after the second half has started
If neither the better team down the road or your own shower of s**t can hurt you
If all men and women countdown to kick off with you, but none too much to overshadow the pyrotechnics
If you can fill the unforgiving five minutes of the VAR check,
and fill it with 300 seconds of endurance watching a referee get the attention he/she craves
Yours is Football and every irritating ar**hole in it
And which is more, you'll be a Fan, my son/daughter!
*When the Fun Stops Stop*
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