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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Matchday - Football TV Coverage in Print!, 30 Jul 2005
I bought this book on a wet July day - the bad weather making it feel like the middle of winter but feeling down as it had been months since a football fix.I've always grown up with my Saturdays full of football, playing as a youngster and avidly watching my local non-league football club, then refereeing on the non league circuit. I feel pretty lost without football on a Saturday. I could identify quickly with the book and I sure to many people football is more than just the 90 minutes of the game, it is all that goes with it, the people you meet, the smell of the food, the journey to different places, the feeling of optimism and anticipation in the morning, the feeling of despair or elation at the end of the day. Chris Green cleverly captures all of this with a day's diary of people's matchdays (the referee, the director, the club Chaplin, the supporter, the manager, the player) to give an idea of their view of football and the place Saturday occupies in their heart. The book jumps around from person to person and at first you wonder whether it will work. It does excellently with longer interviews that build up to the 3pm kick off, and then short sharp paragraphs during the game that reflect the intensity of the 90 minutes of football. It mirrors TV coverage with detailed interviews early on (like on Football Focus), quick and unplanned coverage during matchday (as Sky Soccer Saturday) and then reviews of the day (like you would see on Sky Sports News in the evening). It worked extremely well, and at having read the book by the Sunday evening I d felt I had experienced the matchday I d been do longing for.
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