by Scott Murray
Football For Dummies
Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd The Atrium Southern Gate Chichester West Sussex PO19 8SQ England
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data: A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN: 978-0-470-77022-1
Printed and bound in Great Britain by Bell & Bain Ltd., Glasgow
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
About the Author
Scott Murray is a freelance writer and former sports editor of guardian.co.uk. He writes regularly for guardian.co.uk, the Guardian, the Fiver, and FourFourTwo. He also has written for the Observer, GQ, Mens Health, GQ Sport, Shortlist, the Evening Standard, and Arena. He is co-author of the football miscellany Day Of The Match: A History Of Football In 365 Days, and an upcoming biography of Maurice Flitcroft, the worlds worst golfer: Phantom Of The Open. The club he supports has won quite a lot of trophies, but then he also has to follow Scotland, so it all balances out.
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank everyone at Wiley, especially Simon Bell for his help and never-ending patience, especially upon being quizzed about the managerial merits of Frankie Gray. I would also like to thank Annabel Merullo and Tom Williams at PFD.
Publishers Acknowledgements
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C ongratulations! Youve got a copy of Football For Dummies in your hands. This book has been written specially for people who want to know all they can about the greatest and most popular sport on the planet: association football. Football For Dummies aims to satisfy your curiosity, help you to understand the basics of how to play the game, arm you with knowledge so you can enjoy watching it to the full and show you that you have a whole world of football to be explore. Theres a reason football has taken off all around the globe, after all!
Millions are passionate about the sport, from fans of the beautiful game in Brazil to lovers of soccer in the US. And none more so than fans in the British Isles, where the game as you know it today took off back in the mid 1800s. Its the simplest of sports in principle in the final analysis, all you need to know is that one team has to score more goals than the other to win. Nevertheless, a plethora of laws, tactics and skills exist that can easily flummox the beginner.
Thats where this book comes in. I wrote it so that anyone who wants to enjoy football whether by playing it or watching it can get to grips with the sport quickly and easily, without feeling overwhelmed or intimidated. And I promise it wont be long before youve become something of an expert on the most talked-about sporting pastime in the world. Youll never look back!
The simple aim of Football For Dummies is to provide you with all the basic skills and help you remember every scrap of crucial knowledge that you need to become a football fan. All the information you need is between the covers of this book. But although its all crammed in here, dont feel daunted: you certainly dont have to read every word, from start to finish, to get the most from the book.
Each chapter covers a separate topic about football, so you can easily dip into the chapters to find out about something you dont quite understand. Say youre watching a Champions League game on television, but dont really know much about the history of the competition; just turn to the chapter that talks about important football competitions and Football For Dummies will fill the gaps in your knowledge.