At the end of Liam Mackey's piece in Saturday's Irish Examiner about Noel King's conflict with RTÉ during the international break, Mackey mentions that on his bookshelf lies a book of poetry about football by the Ireland interim manager.
Meantime, I’d like to record here the little-known fact that King once published a book of poems about football – I still have a copy on my shelves. But after the couple of weeks he’s just put in, I’d be very disappointed if his long awaited literary follow-up isn’t a novel of the blockbuster kind, an epic ode to the joys of the beautiful game..
A quick Twitter search showed that Mackey was not the only one to own a copy of this rare text.
Is this book of poetry by Noel King a collector's item? And yes it is THAT N King. Next Tweet will prove it. #coybig pic.twitter.com/1IZM55d6Fr
— Sli Nua Careers (@SliNuaCareers) October 12, 2013
I enjoyed this book when I picked it up somewhere aeons ago. #coybig Noel King, published poet. See previous Tweet pic.twitter.com/U31Ixp93Yr
— Sli Nua Careers (@SliNuaCareers) October 12, 2013
You have to wonder, what other facts do we not know about Irish managers of the past? Does Brian Kerr have a book of haikus? Does Stan have a book of short stories about abut his adventures at Walsall?
And surely one of these poems by King is titled 'Umpteen'.
