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Hot Arse FC

December 01 2023

A time-warping adventure to the past and the future, where Premier League footballers fight for a different kind of survival. From the Pavement’s satirist-in-chief, Chris Sampson


Waiting for another Temporal Assignment adventure, McHaggis meets Snodgrass, a Time Criminal: chucked out of the 1960s for not driving a Mini, failing to be “groovy”, blaspheming that he “prefers Engelbert Humperdinck to the Beatles”, and perhaps worst of all, being given a free ticket to the 1966 World Cup Final but he “couldn’t be bothered to go. It was on TV anyway…”

Thus he was ejected from the swinging decade and sentenced to live out his days in a time loop. These are a kind of jail sentence where the miscreant, via an implant which senses the date and time, is plucked from the end of the allotted era and returned to the beginning.  Sort of like Groundhog Day, but in no way that contravenes any sort of copyright, the Pavement’s lawyers will be relieved to learn. Phew!

Snodgrass had been sentenced to live out his days in the seven weeks of Liz Truss’ tenure as Prime Minister in 2022. McHaggis caught up with Snodgrass on his 24th circuit in the loop.

“God, the Queen’s funeral gets worse every time you see it,” he tutted. “And as for those queue-jumping blighters Phil and Holly…What happened to them in 2023? If you ask me, they should be –”

McHaggis cut him short. “Think yourself lucky to be stuck in 2022. 2023 hasn’t been a picnic for the rest of us.”

Snodgrass nodded. “I’d like to see the Tories voted out of office,” he sighed.

“Hmm,” McHaggis intoned. “That’ll be in 2024.”

He bade farewell to Snodgrass, turning his attention to his latest Temporal Assignment…

Donning a gown of sausages in order to fit in with 2030s fashions, he time-jumped to the near future, in which today’s mega-rich Premier League football clubs have all but gone out of business. Indeed, some have even had to join forces in order to survive. Liverton Rovers, for instance, are now an amalgamation of Merseyside clubs Liverpool, Everton and Tranmere; Palace Wednesday a mixture of Crystal Palace and Sheffield Wednesday; Manchester City a merger of Man United and Man City, though fans of the former complain that their club has disappeared due to its all-powerful neighbours. “Maybe they can rediscover themselves in Fergie Time,” City fans scoffed.

In north London, old rivals Spurs and Arsenal were forced to combine, saving the ‘Hot’ from Hotspur and discarding the ‘nal’ from Arsenal, the new club was branded Hot Arse FC.

It was McHaggis’ job to salvage Hot Arse’s star striker, Pukka D’Orifice, from this nightmarish dystopian future and take him to the Golden Era [ahem!] of our own time.

The Ruritanian international had scored a Dixie Dean-like 60 goals in his first season; even Haaland hadn’t achieved that. D’Orifice was reluctant to leave his own era at first; giving up his £25 per week playing fee was his major concern. “Obviously,” he beseeched McHaggis, “Footballers of the past had to get by on much less wages. How will I survive, playing for the – how you say? – Arsenal FC in your era? Will my wages be sufficient to cover my rent in the homeless hostel, as they do in my era?”

McHaggis grinned. “Oh, I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised by the wages and accommodation of footballers of my time.”

And so D’Orifice was taken to an uncertain future (albeit in his past) by McHaggis, a lifelong Arsenal fan, coincidentally. “Now, just you sign for us and we’ll see if you can boost our chances of winning the league this year…”


McWho?

Some issues ago the brilliant mind of Chris Sampson introduced us to McHaggis, a character able to travel time and is the offspring of Mary Queen of Scots and Malcolm X. Relive some of his old adventures below.

  • McHaggis debuted in issue 144 of the Pavement, pitched as a sitcom idea to a dismissive AI bot. A twist is revealed later in the story that McHaggis is, in fact, the AI bot Chris is addressing in his story
  • The character’s second, and most recent outing, was in the previous issue of the mag (146). McHaggis is sent to various chapters in recent history to right some wrongs
  • Now McHaggis is tasked with transporting a star footballer from the future into the present.

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