cop it

present singular third person cops it · participle present copping it · participle past copped it · past copped it

1. UKslangTo get into trouble; to be punished.

   He shook his black, dishevelled hair ominously and said: "You'll cop it for this!"

   1966, Maxim Gorky, Ronald Wilks, My Childhood

   2 more examples

   "Oh, you'll cop it," said the recruit. "The sergeant has been here twice looking for you."

   1915, Lyman Abbott, Ernest Hamlin Abbott, Hamilton Wright Mabie, Francis Rufus Bellamy, The Outlook

   I suppose he must have been all right, because you don't half cop it for killing a soldier.

   1970, Alfred Edgar Coppard, Ninepenny Flute

   Synonyms: catch it, catch hell, get it