Here's some more prose from the Darlo poet, Gavin Ellis, about the 2019-20 season

BOXING MATCH

It’s Boxing Day today we play our friends from Spennymoor

We hope the game will give us a festive hangover cure

Campbell puts us one up as he strolls through the defence

The Moors fans throw missiles from behind the Blackwell fence

The lead lasts just four minutes, a cross comes in and then

Glen Taylor heads a leveller, we yell not him again

Home fans wind up Chandler he doesn’t seem to care

The referee blows for half time the contest still all-square

With the game remaining even and heading for a draw

A Spennymoor defender bundles Sean Reid to the floor

Thommo takes the spot kick and hopes to make the grade

It’s there, his hundredth Darlo goal and history is made

BLYTH SPIRIT

Our last game of the decade draws a fifteen hundred crowd

Alun Armstrong’s former club, the lads must do us proud

Our coaches rack up early and park upon the kerb

We raid the nearby fish shop, the haddock is superb

Sean Reid puts us one-nil up, the away end starts to cheer

Croft Park in Blyth does generate a super atmosphere

Alun Armstrong takes some stick, it must cut like a knife

He gave The Spartans’ faithful three years of his life

When Donawa gets into space and scores a second goal

The three points are secured, the second half’s a stroll

We end the decade back on form, a super Saturday

But something evil’s stirring in a market far away

20/20 VISION

It’s New Year’s Day we continue with our hectic festive mixture

It’s Spennymoor yet again the reverse of last week’s fixture

We hope to start the decade with three points in the bag

With such a busy schedule let’s hope we don’t flag

Chris Elliott’s left in No Man’s Land, a striker bearing down

The Quakers quickly equalise as a cross comes from the right

Donawa heads home bullet-like using all his might

The Quakers’ strikers mount attacks, the performance is quite bold

But Spennymoor’s goal seems all bricked up in the shape of Matthew Gould

By Armstrong’s own admission he decides to chase a win

Buy Spennymoor score two late goals, so we take it on the chin