'The ever-readable Wilson explores the psychological pressures of being cast in the role of the scapegoat ... Thought-provoking and full of interesting detail ... this book scores on every level' INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY

Aloof, solitary, impassive, the crack goalie is followed in the streets by entranced small boys. He vies with the matador and the flying aces, an object of thrilled adulation. He is the lone eagle, the man of mystery, the last defender' Vladimir Nabokov

Albert Camus, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Yevgeny Yevtushenko, Pope John Paul II, Julian Barnes and not forgetting Nabokov himself ... it's safe to say the position of goalkeeper has over the years attracted a different sort of character than your average footballer.

In this first-ever cultural history of the 'loner' between the posts, Jonathan Wilson traces the sometimes dangerous intellectual and literary preoccupations of the keeper, and looks at how the position has secured a certain existential cool. He travels to the Bassa region of Cameroon, which has produced two of Africa's greatest keepers, and also to Romania to talk to Helmuth Duckadam, who saved four penalties for Steaua Bucharest in the 1986 European Cup final. His absorbing tactical and technical insights into football history even take us back to the days when matches were contested without a man between the sticks.

THE OUTSIDER is the definitive account of that most mysterious of footballing personalities - the goalkeeper.

The first-ever cultural, tactical and historical history of the goalkeeper, by Jonathan Wilson, acclaimed author of INVERTING THE PYRAMID.

About the Author
Jonathan Wilson is a columnist for the Guardian and the founder and editor of The Blizzard. Inverting the Pyramid: The History of Football Tactics was Football Book of the Year in 2009 and was shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year award. Seven of his other books have been shortlisted for football book of the year and he has also won the Premio Antonio Ghirelli in Italy. Angels with Dirty Faces did the double of football book and history book of the year at the Polish Sports Book Awards in 2018. He is a three-time recipient of the FSA Football Writer of the Year award and in 2023 was granted an honorary doctorate by the University of Sunderland. He writes for the Guardian and in 2011 founded The Blizzard, which he still edits. Follow him on Twitter: @jonawils Jonathan Wilson's Inverting the Pyramid won the National Sporting Club Book of the Year award, and was shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year award. His other books include Behind the Curtain: Travels in Eastern European Football; Sunderland: A Club Transformed; The Anatomy of England: A History in Ten Matches; Nobody Ever Says Thank You, a critically acclaimed biography of Brian Clough; The Outsider: A History of the Goalkeeper; The Anatomy of Liverpool; Angels with Dirty Faces: The Footballing History of Argentina; and The Anatomy of Manchester United. He writes for the Guardian, Sports Illustrated and World Soccer, and he is the editor of The Blizzard. Follow him on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/jonawils

Reviews
A splendid history of football's complicated scapegoats * DAILY TELEGRAPH *
In THE OUTSIDER, Jonathan Wilson offers an ebullient history of the goalkeeper and tries to work out what it is that attracts the spiritual, the quizzical, the odd and the reflective to the position ... Wilson offers a picture of the goalkeeper as an outsider, but also more of an everyman than you might think * INDEPENDENT *
A splendid history of the goalkeeper, whose lot has tended to be a thankless one (just ask Joe Hart). Wilson tells tales of violence against goalies, both verbal and physical, along with the burden of psychic stress carried by these singular players * SUNDAY TELEGRAPH *
The ever-readable Wilson explores the psychological pressures of being cast in the role of the scapegoat ... Thought-provoking and full of interesting detail ... this book scores on every level * INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY *
From the obese to the heroic and the corrupt, goalkeepers provide endless anecdotal material. Wilson weaves it together skilfully, from Victorian times to the present, from Charterhouse to Cameroon. The case for the position provoking a kind of existential unease is elegantly made * LITERARY REVIEW *
From Albert Camus to John Paul II, and all points in between - a superb account of the men who wear different shirts and play be different rules from everybody else. * READERS DIGEST *
From Albert Camus to John Paul II, and all points in between - a superb account of the men who wear different shirts and play be different rules from everybody else. * READERS DIGEST *
A splendid history of the goalkeeper, whose lot has tended to be a thankless one (just ask Joe Hart). Wilson tells tales of violence against goalies, both verbal and physical, along with the burden of psychic stress carried by these singular players * THE SUNDAY TELEGRAPH *



Book Information
ISBN 9781409129844
Author Jonathan Wilson
Format Paperback
Page Count 368
Imprint Orion (an Imprint of The Orion Publishing Group Ltd )
Publisher Orion Publishing Co
Weight(grams) 308g
Dimensions(mm) 198mm * 130mm * 30mm