SPORTS books used not to get the credit they often deserved. Football was viewed as a distraction from real life, a hobby, maybe an obsession, but not a serious subject. There were exceptions: C. L. R. James’s Beyond a Boundary earned wide respect and contained the great quotation “What do they know of cricket who only cricket know?”
Times are happily a-changing. Chris Bowlby’s No Complacency: Life, death, football and the cathedral on the hill is an outstanding example of a sports book that engages with life, death, grief, globalisation, our relationship with Germany, mental health, sexism, and the impact of the digital age, as well as with football, its history, its beauty, and its agony (Viewpoint, 19 June).
The prompt for the book is Chris’s love for his son Ewan, who died from brain cancer in December 2022. They shared a love of football and, in particular, of Newcastle United. The “Cathedral on the Hill” is St James’ Park, the football ground, not Newcastle Cathedral — the cathedral of Chris’s father, Ron, the Bishop (1973 to 1980), also a lover of football.
“No Complacency” refers to the way in which Ewan and Chris messaged each other towards the end of a game in the hope that no late goal by the opposition would bring “crushing disappointment”. Don’t sit back, don’t invite the opposition on to you. Good advice for life. And Chapter 3 notes that those words “No Complacency” were also used by Lord Justice Taylor in the aftermath of the Hillsborough disaster about crowd safety. The book shows how the words also apply relevantly to looking after football clubs, communities, relationships, grief, and the values of respect and concern for others.
The book is about life and death, the life of communities, of the football community, of wider society, the lives and deaths of people in the football world, and the life and death of a son. There is also humour. Ewan wrote that “spiritual insights and liberating perspectives could seem more appealing when conveyed in the language of laughter.” In 2022, Ewan heard a football manager express his “regret at the Queen’s passing”. Ewan’s instant comment was “But what about her heading or ball control?”
This is, of course, a book for those of us who love football. It is also a book for those who would like a window into the world of football together with profound insights into grief, community, and the changes in our world in the past 50 years.
The Revd Henry Corbett is Chaplain to Everton Football Club.
No Complacency: Life, death, football and the cathedral on the hill
Chris Bowlby
Herne Books £20
(978-1-917665-12-4)
Church Times Bookshop £18
Listen to an interview with Chris Bowlby here