{"product_id":"coffee-table-book-of-soccer-paperback","title":"Coffee Table Book of: Soccer (Paperback)","description":"\u003cp\u003eCoffee Table Book of: Soccer is a large-format coffee table book of soccer, printed edge to edge in colour, one picture to a page and the widest carried across two: the ball, the goal and the pitch, boots and kit, the goalkeeper and the referee, the ground from dawn to night, the old games before one set of laws, and play seen from far off.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIt opens with the ball: an old laced leather ball in wet grass at dawn, a ball half stitched with its needle and thread, a ball high in a pale evening sky and a black and white ball on cracked dry earth.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThen the pitch and its lines: mown stripes running to a far goal, the penalty spot, a yellow corner flag and the centre circle from high above. Then boots and kit: old high leather boots, a boot beside a tin of dubbin, shin guards and rolled socks and plain white shirts on pegs in an old changing room.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThen the goalkeeper: padded gloves by a post, a dive silhouetted at evening and a keeper on the line seen through the net at dusk. Then the referee: a whistle on the touchline, the yellow and red cards, an assistant's flag and an old pocket watch.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThen the ground, hour by hour: a goal among fallen autumn leaves, empty concrete terraces, a floodlight pylon in night fog, quartered oranges for half-time, a village pitch with cows grazing beyond, white frost at sunrise and an orange ball on snow.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThen training: orange cones at dawn, a ball against an old brick wall, a player keeping the ball up at sunset and a wall of free-kick boards.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThen futsal, beach and street: barefoot players by a goal on a beach at sunset, an empty cage pitch under one lamp at night, a rooftop pitch at evening, a dusty village pitch with a goal of rough poles and a pitch between a fjord and steep mountains.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eShort notes run through the book. They are about the game, its ball, goal, pitch, kit, officials, laws, words and history rather than about the pictures: the goal nets that came into use around 1890 and helped to settle arguments over whether a ball had gone in, the goalkeeper who became a separate position in 1871, the goal that could be scored at any height until a tape was stretched between the posts in 1866 and a crossbar followed in 1883, and the hat-trick, which began in cricket, where a bowler who took three wickets with three balls won a hat.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePrinted in full colour on heavy 150gsm coated paper at 216 x 279 mm (8.5 x 11 inches), as a paperback.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Cedar Pine Editions","offers":[{"title":"Perfect Bound","offer_id":68150577398064,"sku":"9671456005003","price":14.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0262\/2357\/5085\/files\/9671456005003.jpg?v=1792649658","url":"https:\/\/www.thegreatbritishbookshop.co.uk\/products\/coffee-table-book-of-soccer-paperback","provider":"The Great British Bookshop","version":"1.0","type":"link"}