Full Description
A lifelong soccer player and award-winning author shows us how the sport transcends races, ethnicities, cultures, and experiences and brings us all closer together.
Tim Bascom spent half his childhood in Kansas and the other half in East Africa. Living and traveling around the world, the game of soccer proved a constant truth. Through storytelling that effortlessly flows between poignant and funny, sobering and charming, Bascom explores why soccer matters so much in our common, everyday lives, and how this ordinary yet extraordinary game can bring us all a little closer together.
His passionate vision for this most global game leads Bascom to describe how soccer brought him sanity in the middle of a brutal revolution in Ethiopia and how bridging divisions of race and culture was key to success for teams he joined in Chicago and Kansas. From watching Arsenal's energetic rise in the Premier League to the bravery of a besieged Afghanistan Women's National Team, and from pickup games in the Midwest and the Middle East, Bascom finds universal truths and deeply human meaning in the beautiful game of soccer.
Contents
Preface: Hmmm. Should You Read This Book?
1. First Tackle
Did You Know? Historical Origins of the Game
2. On Using One's Head
3. One for the Ages
Did You Know? How the Ball Evolved
4. Stress, Soccer, and Relief!
5. Up in the Air
Did you Know? How Soccer Got Its Goals
6. Soccer at All Costs?
7. A Toast to the Toughest!
Did You Know? Why Al the Goal-Scoring Hullabaloo?
8. ¿Hablas EspaÑol? ¿Hablas FÚtbol?
9. One Game but Many Points of View
Did you Know? Just How University Is This Game?
10. Offsides! Yankee Fans in a Premier Palace
11. Pride vs. Spirit
Did You Know? Pioneers of Women's Soccer
12. Why I Can's Stop Playing
13. Religion vs. Soccer
Did You Know? Even Bob Marley Played!
14. Coaching Chaos
15. Wonder Girl
Did You Know? How Referees Took Charge
16. No Ball? No Problem!
17. Out in the Open
Did You Know? How Indoor Soccer Began
18. A United Nations of Soccer—in Kansas?
19. The Darker Side
Did You Know? A Homeless World Cup
20. Mr. Soccer—Oumar Seck
21. Football to FÚtbol
Did You Know? Why International Games are Called Caps
22. Building Soccer Bridges
23. A Family Affair
Did You Know? War, Soccer, and a Surprising Truce
24. Bishops with Balls
25. Reasons We Watch
Did You Know? Random (but Fun) Facts
26. Camaraderie
27. No Matter What!
Did You Know? Who Outlasted All the Others?
28. The Old Man and the Knee
Acknowledgments
