'I fell in love with football as I was later to fall in love with women: suddenly, inexplicably, uncritically, giving no thought to the pain or disruption it would bring…'. Is there a truer way of stating the way a fan falls in love with a sport and more specifically with his or her team?
Set out with chapters primarily as match reports of key games, Hornby intertwines the goings-on on the Highbury turf with the changing situations in his life. The only constant of course was Arsenal and his unconditional love for them. But this isn’t a book about Arsenal as such; it’s a book about growing up and making sense of your place in the world.
But given its now historical context it is also a glimpse into a world now long gone. First published in 1992, all of the football Hornby experiences in the book are of a pre-Premier League vintage. For those not old enough to have experienced what came before Sky’s “whole new ball game” this book is a glimpse into the past; a window into football’s dark era of riot police presence, “Football Special” trains with prison-like condition and genuine fear for safety at football. It is also a glimpse into a time when fans could attend cheaply on scruffy and rain-soaked terraces, fathers could take their sons without having to take out a second mortgage, the unique terrace chants were far more adventurous and contained far more variety than they do today, and the sanitised football watching experience of the current day was far away.
However there is plenty here for the non-football nut too, as the autobiographical nature of the book contains many sharp observations on life and growing up. It would also provide an understanding of that sports obsessed person in your life. A classic of its day, that became a classic of the sports genre.
- Aidan Williams http://thesportsbookreview.com
Publisher - Riverhead Trade; 1st Riverhead trade pbk. ed edition
Date of Publication - March 1, 1998