How Football (Nearly) Came Home: Adventures in Putin’s World Cup Audiobook (Free)

The summer of 2018: England sweltered in probably the most sustained heatwave for 42 years, the federal government tore itself apart over offers and no deals, and hundreds of mls away, within a taciturn and strange state, the nationwide football team did the unthinkable in the World Cup: they didn’t screw it up.

The England team that touched down in Russia for the 2018 World Cup was a new-look outfit: there have been no real stars, no overblown egos, and no dickheads. Still reeling from the wincing about how exactly Football (Nearly) Came House: Travels in Putin’s Globe Cup leave to Iceland in the 2016 Euros, objectives had been at an all-time low. Certification had been simple if not magnificent, and pundits and enthusiasts alike had been lukewarm about the team’s chances. Just avoiding humiliation could have counted as some kind of success. As the tournament kicked off, a stunningly stage-managed event by Putin and his cronies at FIFA, most of us took a deep inhale of breath and waited for the unavoidable: technical ineptitude and crap fines.

How wrong we were. Over another three weeks, as back home we dissolved in the heat, our football team gave us cause to believe. We squeaked a earn against Tunisia, trounced Panama and acquired a great tactical defeat to Belgium to start the pull to the final. We all bought waistcoats and eulogised Southgate’s calm, fatherly manner. We all fell deeply in love with ‘Slabhead’, aka Harry Maguire. And we did it all towards the tune of ‘It’s Coming Home’.

Barney Ronay was there through the entire competition, criss-crossing over Russia while he followed the Britain team, and the rest, on their search for glory. Here, he captures the places and sounds, the twists and transforms, the bad meals and the fantastic football that added into causeing this to be World Cup one of the biggest ever.