The Bottom Corner by Nige Tassell
Everyone loves an FA Cup upset: a smug Premier League team being knocked out by plucky underdogs. In these days of oligarch owners, superstar managers and players on sky-high wages, the tide is turning against the big teams as fans search for football with a soul. Enter non-league football – the heartland of the beautiful game. Nige Tassell spends a season among the characters who inhabit this world. The raffle-ticket seller who wants her ashes scattered in the centre-circle. The envelope salesman who discovered a future England international. The ex-pros still playing with undiluted passion on Sunday mornings. One thing unites them: they are all dreamers. Tassell ventures all over the footballing map, from the giantkillers of Salford City to hungover cloggers on Hackney Marshes, interviewing obsessive groundhoppers, record-smashing goalscorers, dictatorial managers, ukulele-strumming fans and the captain of the Filipino national team. He makes extended stopovers at both new boys Tranmere Rovers looking for a speedy return to the Football League and the inhabitants of the `bottom corner’ Bishop Sutton, who are just trying to get eleven men on a pitch. Hope and ambition. Triumph and tragedy. Faith and despair. All human life is here in the win-or-sink drama of non-league football.
"Warm and celebratory but also sharp and insightful, The Bottom Corner is a love letter to non-league football that is also a vivid snapshot of its place in our national life" -- Stuart Maconie
"Not since The Football Man has a book so captured the passion of the gameThe Bottom Corner is a wonderful journey through life in the lower reaches of the football pyramid. A fascinating tale of a very different world of football from that of the overpaid stars of the television age." -- Barry Davies
"Extraordinary" -- Danny Baker
"Excellent" -- Andrew Collins (Classic FM, UKTV, Radio Times)
"An entertaining exploration of the quirks, commitment and romance of football away from the pumped-up bluster of the top flight." -- Ed Wilson * When Saturday Comes *
"Not since The Football Man has a book so captured the passion of the gameThe Bottom Corner is a wonderful journey through life in the lower reaches of the football pyramid. A fascinating tale of a very different world of football from that of the overpaid stars of the television age." -- Barry Davies
"Extraordinary" -- Danny Baker
"Excellent" -- Andrew Collins (Classic FM, UKTV, Radio Times)
"An entertaining exploration of the quirks, commitment and romance of football away from the pumped-up bluster of the top flight." -- Ed Wilson * When Saturday Comes *
Nige Tassell writes about sport and music, and his work has appeared in the pages of FourFourTwo, the Guardian, The Sunday Times, Esquire, New Statesman, Q and The Word. He is also the author of The Bottom Corner: Hope, Glory and Non-League Football. He lives in the hill country of Somerset with his wife and two prospective future non-league players.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9780224100595 |
| ISBN 10 | 0224100599 |
| Title | The Bottom Corner |
| Author | Nige Tassell |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Vintage Publishing |
| Year published | 2016-09-01 |
| Number of pages | 320 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |