All Intensive Purposes

Nick Hornby and company become responsible for Cambridge United's continued good fortune:

What happened was, Chris Roberts bought a sugar mouse from Jack Reynolds ('The Rock King'), but its head off, dropped it in the Newmarket Road before he could get started on the body, and it got run over by a car. And that afternoon Cambridge United, who had hitherto been finding life difficult in the Second Division (two wins all season, one home, one away), beat Orient 3-1, and a ritual was born. Before each home game we all of us trooped into the sweet shop, purchased our mice, walked outside, bit the head off as though we were removing the pin from a grenade, and tossed the torsos under the wheels of oncoming cars; Jack Reynolds would stand in the doorway watching us, shaking his head sorrowfully. United, thus protected, remained unbeaten at the Abbey for months.

Nick Hornby, Fever Pitch 109-10 (Riverhead, 1998).