Download The Bottom Corner: A Season With The Dreamers Of Non-League Football Picturized By Nige Tassell Provided As EPub

enoyed this book. Brilliantly descriptive writing from a variety of stakeholders documenting a season in nonleague, Would recommend to any football fan, When my team dropped into non league I was devastated, However the years spent watching them in non league football before finally being promoted out of it were the most enjoyable in myyears of watching live football.

Non league football is real football, not plastic like the Premier League,
Those who support non league teams do so not for the glory but because they love their team,
This is a great book about a great side of English football that is completely overlooked by the BBC, Beautiful read, loved every page of this, Such a great read! So refreshing to read about life at clubs where football is the most important thing, Would recommend! A decent football read, Jumps from place to place introducing new places and people throughout so it can feel a bit loosely linked, Nige's distaste for the upper echelons of football occasionally seeps into the chapters, which makes it seem a bit embittered at times, It has whetted my appetite for nonleague football after the covid era, though, NonLeague Football has enjoyed something of a renaissance in the internet age news of its oddities spread quicker, youtube viewings of outrageous halfway line goals are common, results are available at fingertips and there will always be a small corner of the web to focus on your particular obsession.


But its the morasslike nature of nonleague that can also make it seem unessential Maidenhead United may float my boat but they are unlikely to float yours while debating a disallowed goal for Woking at Barrow is unlikely to rival the Great British Bake Off as a water cooler topic of conversation.


So distilling what makes the alleyways and ginnels of NonLeague so persistently enjoyable is a tough job no matter how much the BBC tried to pretend that Wayne Shaws pie eating antics were amusing as Sutton United took on Arsenal, most of us were simply exasperated while the sight of hoardings emblazoned with adverts for The Sun at Gander Green Lane was enough for many of us to plead to the Premier league fat cats that we did, after all, still prefer their version of the sport.


So Nige Tassell has done us all a great service by reminding us of what makes NonLeague football a key part of the fabric of British soccer in his book The Bottom Corner.


This is all due to the authors shrewd choice of topics, While the fortunes of Tranmere Rovers and Somersets Bishop Sutton FC over the course of theseason are a thread that links the ten entertaining chapters in Tassells book, hes chosen wisely to concentrate on subjects that reach beyond the humdrum events at a particular club.


Hence, we have examinations of former Premier Leaguers now plying their trade several divisions below Julio Arca, Barry Hayles, FA Cup third round appearance makers Eastleigh FC, clubs started up in protest FC United of Manchester, prodigious goalscorers who may or may not be the new Jamie Vardy Emleys Ashley Flynn and phoenix clubs Hereford FC.


Theres also room for the hipsters of Dulwich Hamlet who, as we suspected, are nothing of the sort but quite as genuine as the next bunch of anoraks fan ownership in the shape of Lewes FC and the societal ecosystem of Hackney Marshes.
All along, the smell of stale tea and sound of football boots being clattered together in an attempt to get rid of mud loom large.


English footballs siege mentality and unwillingness to mend its ways is evident too the potty mouths of Hackney, uncompromising management style of Salford Citys Anthony Johnson and cliché spouting of Bishop Suttons Colin Merrick reminded me too much of my own generally unenjoyable days taking on the pub teams of Bracknell in the East Berks League but for all the huff and puff, there are stories such as that of United Glasgow, formed to provide a club to play for for asylum seekers.


Personally, Ive most enjoyed my nonleague experiences when I have had a team to support weekin and weekout and when taking in individual matches, the day quickly becomes more about the before and after, the drinks and the chance to visit somewhere new than the football itself.
So, Im less of an evangelist for the genre than many of my blogging peers such as The Real FA Cup and The Cold End.
Tassells excellently written and good natured volume did remind me of what a treasure trove sport at this level can be, however, This is a very good book which looks at all aspects of footballing life below the top four divisions, What impresses is the depth of the coverage: the author spends time at Tranmere Rovers, expected to bounce straight back into Leaguefrom the National League, but also visits the casual Sunday footballers playing on Hackney Marshes.
What's more, he interviews international players plying their trade below the fourth tier, writes about a socalled hipster nonleague club and pays regular visits to a side struggling at the tenth level of English football.


'The Bottom Corner' is interesting and wellwritten, My only gripe about this book are the superlatives that adorn the cover "fascinating" "sharp and insightful" "extraordinary", That's only because this captures so well so many of my experiences enjoying the wonder that is nonleague football, A celebration of the real game, Thanks for sharing. I should have written a book myself! Life in the football nonleagues of England, all the way down to theth level and a trip to Hackney Marshes to meet the various people who keep the small teams going.


Along the way we'll meet a former head of the FA, a shipping container, a live bull, tragedy but above all we'll meet hope.
No matter what level you are its the hope that keeps you going, The subject matter wont appeal to everyone but if it does seem appealing, you will not be disappointed, Great reporting and stories that tug at your heart strings, In The Bottom Corner, author Nige Tassell casts light on the nonleague echelons of English football and explores the cast of characters involved in keeping afloat the clubs that live and die by individual results.
Through this romanticised pallor, the reader is brought into a world underrepresented in slick, mainstream football mediaa world that exists below that much vaunted line of professional demarcation, yet seems to actively push against it to remain apart.


Two narratives are presented in depth, Bishop Sutton, cellar dweller of the Toolstation Western League Division One, can barely muster a team to avoid the ignominy of a winless season, Tranmere Rovers “a starcrossed football club that perpetually finds new and painful ways to kick its fans in the gut”, ohsoclose to

a Premier League berth someyears ago, attempts to return to the professional league on the first try.
No slickly crafted, feelgood tropes of miraculous comebacks and lastminute winners abound here, Instead, these two narratives serve to show just how tumultuous the going can be in nonleague football, and how nothing is guaranteed amidst the turgid play of parttimers slugging away at each other for a shot at individual glory at the professional level.


In between these narratives and over ten fascinating chapters, characters emerge that provide shape and substance to nonleague football, A Philippines international captain in the twilight of his career, A striker trying his best to get back into the national Gibraltar setup, A reluctant goal machine “Ive put eighty balls in the net” who is also restricted in movement due to a driving ban, A young Sierra Leonean and Chelsea Ucastoff looking for his place in football, Such vignettes serve to highlight the “tension between collective ambition, between team and self, is omnipresent, no matter what level”,

Only in the muddy scrabble of nonleague could there be a motley bunch, Coaching staff and fans are well represented, of course, in the pages of The Bottom Corner, So are wellmeaning footballing anoraks steeped in the glory of groundhopping “blokes who are fortyfive onwards, Were all trainspotters or extrainspotters, as well as the entrenched volunteers such as those at Salford FC refusing to move their food stalls despite Gary Nevilles insistence.
Rarely is there disaffection amongst these types, and when there is, something glorious comes out of itthe formation of FC United of Manchester conceived at a series of curry houses comes to mind here.


Where there is glory, however, there is also tragedy, The deaths of two Worthing United players at Shoreham while commuting to a game bookends The Bottom Corner, There is also tragedy that touches on the inherent difficulties faced by nonleague clubs and officials, An honest toiler misses training because he has been held in detention a septuagenarian referee continues officiating out of love, but also because of a lack of young referees and a successful team completely gutted when its gaffer takes his players and staff to a more competitive level.
When BBC presenter Mark Chapman was quoted about nonleague football, “I love it, It feels earthy, it feels real, Its the noise, its the Bovril, its the smell of a pie thats been there a week and a half”, he possibly didnt have in mind the woundup clubs, the sodden and empty pitches from cancelled games, and the clear lack of investment from Englands ruling football body.
This is nonleague reality.

Nige Tassell does a remarkable job bringing these stories together, He does, however, seem to spread himself a little thin at times, A such, many stories are naturally openended and lack a takeaway lesson, A bit of context with the structure of nonleague football would not go astray, particularly for someone not familiar with the vagaries of it, The Bottom Corner is a breezy read, and clearlyas has been previously discussedcontains plenty of special moments that will resound with the reader beyond the last page.
There are also plenty of those Oh, so thats where that player ended up! moments,

HIGHLIGHTED PASSAGE pg,:
Upon coaching staff of phoenix club Hereford FC returning to the abandoned Edgar Road home ground of the woundup Hereford United:

“In the home dressing room, the detritus of the final training session lay everywheremuddy shirts, screwedup socks and mildewing towels.
Upstairs in the bar, the beer had been festering in the pipes for six months, while a selection of mince pies lay untouched on a tray.
The Christmas decorations were still up, Everything seemed to be waiting for the arrival of a crack forensics team to dust for prints, ”