John Osborne

I am a writer, performer and poet. I've written three books: Radio Head, The Newsagent's Window and What if men burst in wearing balaclavas.

Praise for Radio Head (Radio 4's Book of the Week)
Captivating - Martin Kelner, The Guardian
Funny, personal and charming, The Daily Telegraph
It made me go out and buy a new radio, Tim Key.

Michael Owen's Cheeky Accumulator

I wrote this after Spain beat Germany in the semi-final. I put a fiver on Spain winning the World Cup before it started so I've still got a chance of winning £25. And when one of your sources of income is writing poems, you need all the extra help you can get. I quite like betting on football, I've probably won more than I've lost. At the end of last season I won £18 on an accumulator and bought a new pair of trousers. Gambling is useful for me. But I don't understand why people bet when they are already millionaires. There's a few footballers who love gambling on horses, including Michael Owen. This is a poem about him.



Michael Owen's Cheeky Accumulator
I don't understand why you gamble
I don't know how much you earned at Liverpool
and Real Madrid and in your sponsorship deals with Umbro
and Jaguar and Pro Evolution Soccer

and Persil
but I guess you earn more in a year
than everyone in my cul de sac, put together
earn in a lifetime.

So I don't understand why I saw you the other day
at Victoria station
at the bottom of the escalators
and although it was impresive to see you with a mouth organ

and a guitar, and cowbells on your shoes
and a drumkit on your back
do you really need loose change
from commuters and tourists?

We all saw you on Deal or no Deal
why did you go on that?
You were wearing a fake beard
and we could all see the elastic holding it on

but there was something about the smug way
you kept saying 'No deal, Noel'
that turned the studio audience against you.
You just love to gamble

and I guess it must be hard to recreate the euphoria
of when you scored that goal against Argentina
and the whole of England assumed
you were going to win the World Cup on your own

but when the rest of the country were cheering you on
immediately I worried about your hamstrings.
Because life is more than taking on four defenders and then scoring
once the crowd have gone home

and have stopped wearing your replica shirt
and the post match interviews are done
life can be boring
and when your horse comes in at Cheltenham

it doesn't matter how much you win
it won't make your Cruciate Ligaments any better.

There's a dog in the playground!

This was written during the Holland v Uruguay game, when Uruguay needed a goal during injury time. I wanted the keeper to go up front. That's the main reason people watch football. This is a clip of Jimmy Glass, the Carlisle goalkeeper who scored in the 4th minute of injury time and meant Carlisle didn't get relegated from the Football League.



This poem's called There's a dog in the playground. 'A baker falls over' is a line taken from Tim Clare's project where he wrote one hundred poems in a day.

There's a dog in the playground!

I like it when life is thrown into chaos
a friend grows a beard
TV programmes are disrupted by rolling news
a goalkeeper runs up for a corner
sprinting like an escaped con
the defenders all look at each other
'We've not got a plan for this.'

There's a dog in the playground!
For months everyone in school says
Do you remember when there was a dog in the playground!
wiping away tears of joy.

Once I was in the marketplace
and a baker fell over
me and another man helped him to his feet
walked him to the bakery
and the next day when I went to buy bread
the shop was shut
and there were sirens in the distance.

The dreaded penalty shoot out

I'm (still) writing a poem every day during the World Cup. This is the inevitable poem about the inevitable penalty shoot out.

The dreaded penalty shoot out

It would be brave
to watch this game without a book by your side.

By half time you've already snoozed for fifteen minutes
and on your third cup of tea and second dinner

and after the ad breaks
you've never been so keen to do housework

you volunteer to do the hoovering
anything to drown out the sound of vuvuvzelas

and Jim Beglin. You make tomorrow's sandwiches
for everyone who lives on your street

wrap them in tin foil and post them through every letterbox
and hope everyone likes corned beef

and in extra time you can't wait to scrub the hob
because there's no TV in the kitchen

you clean behind the fridge
and wonder if it's too late to mow the lawn

or take all that wood in the garage to the skip
and by the second half of extra time

the house has never looked so immaculate
Mr Pledge and Mr Muscle kick back with a beer

after a job well done
and the commentator says 'Well nobody likes to see a penalty shoot out'

but if that's the case why are we all still watching?
We need to be put out of our misery

we've got stuff to get on with.

Day 15

Written the day England lost against the nasty Germans.

It's called Washing off the face paint. (title suggested by Dr Joel Stickley).

Me and my friends were so optimistic
a few beers, then paint each others faces
but it's not turned out as we'd predicted
so we trundle back from the terraces

and now we're all scraping off the make up
it wasn't supposed to turn out like this
things will seem much better when we wake up
but right now we're dwelling on near misses.

A clown driving back late to his bedsit
an argument on an anniversary
a honeymoon suite that smells of Lemsip
no one turns up at your surprise birthday

we're all scrubbing off our St George's flags
and go to bed early, remorse and sad.

Day 14

The England team

Centre backs with as much pace
as my granddad listening to Gardener's Question Time
on his allotment.

A midfield that plods along
like a Des'ree song

wingers like tourists in central London
maps folded out
asking for directions
to Buckin Ham Palace.

A goalkeeper like Boris Johnson
trying to blow a vuvuzela
saying I'm sure there's a knack

wingers like waitresses wearing orthopaedic shoes
carrying a tray of very full champagne glasses

and a substitutes bench as appealing
as a rail replacement service.

Day 13

Written while watching England v Slovenia.

In a pub in Shoreditch

I've got a perfect view of the big screen
the beer is cheap and I can feel myself getting a tan
through the bay windows
the Polish barmaid says she likes my t-shirt
and when I realise I've forgotten my glasses
the man next to me says he has the same prescription
so lends me his spare pair
and neither of us make a Specsavers reference
because this pub is better than that.

Ashley Cole has got the ball
and is looking really lively
and the girls here don't say things like
isn't David James fit with his lovely hair
they say 'look how cleanly he's collecting the ball
and distributing it so quickly.'

At half time I'm the only one who needs a wee
and there isn't a queue at the bar
and they say all the drinks are free until full time
because it's the landlord's 50th birthday
his 25th wedding anniversary
and he bloody loves his footie
and as Gary Lineker and Alan Hansen sum up a really good first half
we all go outside
I sit on a kerb and write this
and the Polish barmaid says
'Are you the guy who's writing a poem about football
every day during the World Cup?
I keep them all in a scrap book.'

When the second half kicks off
me and the man who lent me his glasses
talk about Matthew Upson
and I say 'remember that teacher we had at Primary School?'
he says no, we only just met
and I think yeah I suppose we did.
I take advantage of another of those free beers
and you should see John Terry
crunching into those tackles

and when it gets tense towards the end
I don't bite my fingernails
because I know nothing bad could happen
in a place like this
and when the final whistle blows we all arrange to meet here
for the next game.
I've found the perfect pub to watch the football
and I'm not telling you where it is.