Gavin Mortimer In A History of Football in 100 Objects has written a beautiful, funny insightful history of the beautiful game through various objects which helps to bring the history alive. It mainly is a clever and quirky history that rather than another boring book about footballs history but a unique and interesting account of the games history.
While the history starts in a typical way, at the beginning, from the public school roots of the game with the school bench and a cricket bat through to modern day wad of Euros. Mortimer has taken the timeline of the game and has interpreted it for the reader in a way that they can associate and understand the history. While understanding that history they can retell various parts of that history via the humour and objects in this book.
Object 46 the typewriter took me back to the days when I used to race home from Maine Road (now gone) to get home for the arrival of the Pink Final which had the match report plus all the results of the day. Now we have the internet and it is not just the same, now smell of the ink the bright pink newspaper long gone.
Today when we think of the world cup we think of the money spent the security around the trophy and Englands constant failure since 1966. Who would think that the trophy was once carried to the tournament in a suitcase all the way to the first world cup over in Uruguay? We all know about England not going to that tournament because there is nothing Johnny Foreigner can teach us.
This is a fabulous book for any football fan because we all love our facts and stats to quote at others as if we have a Masters degree in the game. This is a well researched, well thought out incisive history of the beautiful game one that can be read and reread at will.