Who Ate All the Pies?
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"Who Ate All the Pies?" is a famous football chant sung by fans in Britain; although not prescriptively so, it is usually sung to the tune of "Knees Up Mother Brown" and is aimed at supposedly overweight footballers, officials or opposing supporters.
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[edit] The first chant
It is claimed to have first been sung at the huge goalie William Henry Foulke (known as Fatty Foulkes) who was 6 ft 2 inches (188 cm) tall and apparently weighed about 12 stone (170 lb, or 80 kg) when he joined Sheffield United in 1894, but increased to around 24 stone (330 lb, or 150 kg) by 1902, legendarily remaining "agile as a cat" despite his weight. The pioneering film makers Mitchell and Kenyon recorded him in one of the first movies of a football match when they filmed the League Division 1 game at Sheffield United's home ground of Bramall Lane, Sheffield, against Bury on Saturday 6 September 1902. Sheffield won 1-0; but on the Monday the Sheffield Daily Telegraph headlined their report "Cupholders Win A Poor Game". The game was featured in the BBC series "The Lost World of Mitchell & Kenyon".
[edit] Later chants
The chant has been associated with the striker Micky Quinn who played for six football clubs in the 1980s and 1990s. He was particularly identified with the chant following an incident in a match between Quinn's then club Newcastle United and Grimsby Town in March 1992, in which a fan threw a pie onto the pitch which Quinn promptly picked up and devoured, much to everyone's amusement.[citation needed]
[edit] Background
Fans in the UK, at football games have long had a tradition of eating meat pies at half-time, with many thousands of pies being consumed at popular games.
On occasion there aren't enough pies to go round and so any player looking a little overweight gets catcalled with the question "who ate all the pies?".
[edit] The lyrics
The lyrics of the chant are:
- Who ate all the pies?
- Who ate all the pies?
- You fat bastard,
- You fat bastard,
- You ate all the pies!
One popular variation replaces the second line with "The burgers and the fries."
Part of the song (the third line - "You fat bastard") has been adopted by Roy Chubby Brown as his anthem and is enthusiastically chanted by the audiences before his stage performances.
This line was also chanted at gigs by 90s indie band Carter The Unstoppable Sex Machine, and included as the intro on their album 30 Something.
[edit] The vegetarian pie-less version
The Vegetarian Society have used a variant of this, "Who ate all the peas?", as a slogan. They displayed it on promotional hoardings in football grounds as part of their "Men and Meat Campaign", intended to combat the idea that vegetarianism is "something for women". This chant however has failed to catch on around football grounds.
[edit] The Website
- Who Ate All The Pies is also a football website which takes an offbeat look at British football. The site revolves around fun and quirky football news, features and videos.
[edit] Sources
Mick Quinn's autobiography: Who ate all the pies? The life and times of Mick Quinn (ISBN 0-7535-0803-6).
[edit] External links
- "Hitting the Headlines" - an article from the Vegetarian Society's website, used as a reference
- "bfi Video-The Lost World of Mitchell & Kenyon" - start of episode 2 shows Fatty Foulkes at Sheffield United
- Who Ate All The Pies
