I could not wait to read this book only having ever read about the women's football game that sprang up during World War One as a minor footnote in soccer's history. Therefore, it was nice to see that an author had taken the time to do a bit of research into it. However, when I put it down, I was slightly underwelmed. The book is quite short and I put this down to the fact that the sources of information for this work would have been quite slim. That is not the case. What it does do, it does quite well. Using what little official reporting from the press at the time and the memories of the players themselves as well as their relatives, you do get a vivid picture of life in the North of England during the late 1910's and early 1920's. What you do not get are any statistics. After reading the text, I would have loved to have a record of their matches. A statistical record of the players themselves would have been of use as well. Who played in them, the scores, venue etc without having to trawl through the text. I was also a bit fed up with the continual use of lyrics through out the piece. I thought this was meant to be a book on football, not one on poetry. It also finishes very abruptly and the history of the team after the mid 1920's boils down to little more than one sentence. It want to know so much more, but for me, this book failed to delivering. I think that social historians will find little to fault here, but for people like myself who are more interested in sports history, they will feel a little let down.