roll up one's sleeves

English

Pronunciation

• Audio (AU):

  (file)

Verb

roll up one's sleeves

1. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see roll,‎ up,‎ one's,‎ sleeves.
2. (idiomatic) To prepare to work.
   • 2011 October 1, Phil Dawkes quoting Steve Bruce, “Sunderland 2 - 2 West Brom”, in BBC Sport‎^[1]:

     "We could quite easily have folded today but thankfully they rolled up their sleeves and got back into it. We could even have won it. We had a couple of great opportunities but we just ran out of juice."

Synonyms

• belly up to the bar
• get down to brass tacks
• get one's act together
• pull one's socks up
• shape up

Translations

roll one's sleeves up

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 捲起袖子／卷起袖子 (juǎnqǐ xiùzi), 卷起袖子 (juǎnqǐ xiùzi)

• Danish: smøge ærmerne op
• Dutch: de mouwen opstropen
• Finnish: kääriä hihat
• French: retrousser ses manches (fr)
• Galician: arremangar
• German: Ärmel hochkrempeln
• Hungarian: feltűri az inge ujját, feltűri az ingujját
• Icelandic: bretta upp ermarnar
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Italian: rimboccarsi le maniche
• Japanese: 腕まくりする (うでまくりする, udemakuri suru)
• Portuguese: arregaçar as mangas
• Russian: засучи́ть рукава́ pf (zasučítʹ rukavá), заката́ть рукава́ pf (zakatátʹ rukavá)
• Serbo-Croatian: zasuču rukavi
• Spanish: arremangarse (es)
• Swedish: kavla upp ärmarna

prepare to work

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 准备工作 (zhǔnbèi gōngzuò)

• Danish: smøge ærmerne op
• Dutch: de mouwen opstropen
• Finnish: kääriä hihat
• French: retrousser ses manches (fr)
• German: die Ärmel hochkrempeln (de)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Icelandic: láta hendur standa fram úr ermum
• Italian: darsi da fare, rimboccarsi le maniche
• Portuguese: pôr a mão na massa, arregaçar as mangas
• Russian: засучи́ть рукава́ pf (zasučítʹ rukavá)
• Spanish: arremangarse (es), ponerse las pilas (es)
• Swedish: kavla upp ärmarna

See also

• at the coal face
• in the trenches