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Sutton United goalkeeper released for eating meat pie during FA Cup game against Arsenal

The biggest question is whether to call it “Pie-Gate,” “Pie-Ghazi” or the “Pie Papers.”

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Wayne Shaw quickly went from hero to, well, fired.

Wayne Shaw
Shaw ate on the job. (Reuters)

On Monday, we brought you word of the 46-year-old, more-than-300-pound backup goalkeeper for Sutton United of England’s fifth tier. When his team faced mighty Premier League power Arsenal in the fifth round of the FA Cup and lost 2-0, he casually munched on a meat pie on the bench after the third substitution was made, ruling him out of an appearance.

Things, as ever in modern soccer, appear to have been a bit more complicated than that. It turns out that SunBets, the betting arm of the notorious Sun tabloid, which had bought jersey sponsorship for Sutton on its day in the – cough – sun, offered a bet that Shaw would indeed eat a pie during the game.

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Then he did. And the bookie paid out what it claims was a five-figure sum to bettors.

Shaw, nicknamed the “Roly Poly Goalie” by his own teammates, was fully aware of the odds on him snacking on the typical English soccer stadium fare and was glad to oblige. He even conceded to the Daily Mail that he’d done it because of the bet. Shaw even went as far as to admit that he knew “a few of the mates” had bet on it at the 8-1 odds.

As such, he has apparently run afoul of betting laws in English soccer precluding active players from gambling on the sport. The Football Association has opened an investigation. Shaw, who also served as a kind of odd-jobs man at the club, was asked by Sutton to resign, which he did.

You know what? Shaw is still a hero.

And on his way out, he wants you to know that it was actually a pasty, not a pie. Because that’s what a hero does: set the record straight on his own heroism.

And the story has a happy ending for Shaw. Morrisons, an English grocery store chain, has offered him a job as a “pie taster.” The chain told The Independent that it’s “always looking for the best talent” and was “really impressed by [Shaw’s] commitment to pie eating.”

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Leander Schaerlaeckens is a soccer columnist for Yahoo Sports. Follow him on Twitter @LeanderAlphabet.