He moves like a stiffened corpse,
Big dark glasses hide his eyes,
Doubt begins to enter our thoughts,
When off the bat he signals byes
Then a catch to the close in man,
"Not Out" we heard him say,
"But it was obvious" cried our clan,
He replied, "the bowler was in my way"
Our disappointment turned to rage,
Our disbelief was replaced,
His impartiality we could not gauge,
Surely our suspicions were un-based
Out of respect for his position,
We returned attention to the game,
Unsure of his disposition,
Lingering doubts still remained
Perhaps it was just an error,
A perfectly human trait,
Perhaps not a biased terror,
Maybe it was, as he did state
Then an appeal for a nick behind,
Off the innings very last ball,
"Not Out" he cried once again,
"I didn't hear it", this time his call
I would not dare to call him a liar,
But these staggering decisions must have reason,
He is Noble Park's 3rd XI "club" umpire,
But he only stands us once a season
Had we done him wrong in the past,
Or was he just having a very bad day,
The reasons were revealed at last,
When returning the ball at the end of play
From two feet he called for the ball,
The bowler dropped in into his hand,
Through his grasping fingers it did fall,
By his shuffling feet, it did land
It dawned that he could not see,
And then I glimpsed his hearing aide,
Both blind and deaf was he,
Who officiated whilst we played
Just an old man with his faculties departing,
We had two dismissed, but not given out,
Next week will see play re-starting,
I hope he gives me, the benefit of the doubt
Guru
There was a man from Row-ville,
Who bowled with poor control of the pill,
So he stopped having a crack,
Stabbed the McNeil in the back,
And now the top job he does fill!
Overseas Tour (Limerick)
There once was a little "offie" named Hegs,
Who only had 6 inch long legs
He went travelling abroad
To play the Pommy horde
But they wacked him over the boun-dar-y pegs