November 2021: Exceptional

Books read this month: The Accidental Footballer by Pat Nevin (Monoray, 2021); Mind Games: The Ups and Downs of Life and Football by Neville Southall (HarperCollins, 2021).

Pat Nevin and Neville Southall are exceptional people. I don't know them personally, of course, but for the purposes of this writing, they're not typical of their chose profession. They're different. Two of a kind? Perhaps... but not really. I won't generalise on professional footballers, but it's fair to say both Nevin and Southall stood out wherever they played the game. Full disclaimer: I love 'em both. As an Evertonian growing up in the 1980s and 90s, Neville Southall was a hero to me. The best at what he did and a mindset that marked him out as something special. Pat never enjoyed on-the-field success with the Blues like Welshman Southall, but the Scottish magician played his way into the hearts of those who frequented Goodison Park thanks to his fancy footwork and indefatigable work ethic. Mavericks? Maybe. But I find it hard to call Southall, the greatest goalkeeper to have ever played the game and a man with more medals than most, a maverick. Pat's book says it on the front cover blurb, but I feel it's a touch disingenuous. A maverick plays for number one, surely, whereas socialist Nevin always put the team first, sometimes at the cost of his personal ambition.

You'll find this out towards the end of The Accidental Footballer as Nevin hands in a transfer request (not 'slaps'!), heads across the River Mersey to Tranmere Rovers and sets the scene for the follow-up. There's bound to be one, too, as this is a book that is constantly floating down the wing, teasing crosses, cutting inside and chipping onrushing goalkeepers with poise, purpose and percipient insight. Divided across three places from the map of emotional geography inside the author's mind's eye - Glasgow, London and Everton - The Accidental Footballer tells its story walking through the trails and tribulations of becoming a professional sportsman in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Nevin's conversational writing style invites you to join him on a journey that takes in mentors, midfielders and Machiavellian men who are meant to help, but always have an eye on what's coming next in the transient and unforgiving world of professional football. The rub? The young Pat Nevin is none of these things and his imitable instincts and idiosyncrasies result in idolatry from the Stamford Bridge terraces as he helps light up the decade for an up-and-down Chelsea FC. His fellow players? He finds the truth about them somewhere in between sensation and sanguine: "When it came down to it, most players were working class lads with limited interaction who'd spent their lives focusing on football in their own little bubble." They pinch his NME and occasionally ask about his sexuality... why? Must be the pixie boots and Scritti Politti-inspired winter wardrobe, hey Pat? Along the way, Nevin reveals such tasteful tidbits as signing for Everton on the strength of a musical mixtape made for manager Colin Harvey by his daughters (Joy Division, The Fall, Cocteau Twins if you're asking), being invited to meet Morrissey at home and drawing out the ex-Smiths man's familiarity with football and being held hostage in Turkey while nearly signing for Galatasaray! Pat's honesty, humour and humility shine through every footballing reminiscence, but a bit more grit on the other stuff of life wouldn't have hurt and, as you turn the final pages of this hugely enjoyable book, you can't help but hope that the connoisseur can conjure up something with more steel next time.

Speaking of steel, Neville Southall must have balls of it. Not because he's a hard case, but because to draw lines straight as Neville does - especially from corruption to cruelty - takes, well, steely-eyed determination. Mind Games: The Ups and Downs of Life and Football isn't an autobiography, it's an observational self-help book that takes the place of all the insightful journalism you should be reading every day following Brexit and Covid-19 changing the game. A post-pandemic read, Mind Games is a story of strength and heartbreak, and a first responder's reaction to the rituals threatening to ruin the islands the goalkeeping legend calls home. "We’re far too immature to put our fingers on anything without having a massive argument," says Southall when discussing racism, immigration, gender and sex workers. In case you haven't noticed, the Everton legend turns over his Twitter each week to charity workers focusing on all the above and the debates that have followed online inform the chapters of the book. Research? That's the way to do it in 2021: ask the questions you want answers to and let the thread develop. Serious rather than sensationalist, Southall shoots from the hip in Mind Games and its short, sharp, but-never-shocked chapters focus on Fear, Abuse, Failure, Improvement, Racism, Homophobia and Motivation. Southall is not just an author, he works full-time in a special‑needs school in Swansea and the amazing amount of empathy his best writing drips with reveals where his heart really lies: people. This is a book with people at and in its heart and while the big man resists labels and boxes, it's a set of stories with socialism running through its veins and existing on the mantra that nobody wins unless everybody wins.

Come on you Blues! Thanks for reading, Al x