Hatler Pops His Clogs

Pundit mourns 'a lovely chap'

Pundit: In mourning

Caravan: bringing couples together

Hatler: lovely chap, though

Funny old thing, Football. For instance, old colleagues. And their regular inevitable demise.

Line of shotguns

One of my old colleagues, 'Hatler' Henderson, died last Thursday. 'Hatler' was a lovely chap. Sure, he had a bit of a temper on him, he avoided factual truth like a partridge avoids a line of shotguns and of course he did tend to strangle people if they annoyed him. But really, he was a lovely chap. Who could forget him passionately arguing with a member of the crowd in the '58-'59 season after he missed a sitter against Burnley? I thought he was going to jump into the terraces seats and lamp the fellah. Luckily the fellah's grandfather pulled him away. Some of these five year-olds can be pretty feisty.

White slavery

We called him 'Hatler' because he once opined 'That Adolf Hatler knew a thing or two', which summed up both his political views and his grasp of factual accuracy. Lovely chap, though. As far as I know, the white slavery thing was never proved. Anyhoo, a man has to earn a living, don't he?

Confiscated

I didn't agree with those who called him a wife-beater. After all, his wife, Eva, beat him too. It's good for couples to have something in common. I know my wife always feels the same about our caravan. When the police confiscated his hard drive, well, I think they were just going after celebrities by that point; although admittedly most of the public hadn't heard of him by then. I often used to visit him in gaol. He used to greet me with his customary affectionate growl: 'Fag off, you Kent!' Funny really: I'm a Surrey man. Thought he knew. Lovely chap, though.

Tighter

And how he's gone. We won't see his like again. Not now the laws are so much tighter.

Johnny Pundit