Losing My Favourite Game: ‘Caught in a Trap’ with Joseph McCarthy

It’s the penultimate International Break of the year, and while England cruise to qualification, Scotland rue having focussed on developing left-backs over the last decade, Wales continue to give fans false hope before their inevitable brave failure, and Northern Ireland try to work out how they stop the Netherlands from overtaking them, our neighbours across […]

Losing My Favourite Game: ‘Mourning Glory’ with Neil Sherwin

One of the most enduring factors about football fandom - the thing that keeps us coming back time and time again - is that there’s always another chance. Lost at the weekend? There’s always next week. Relegated in May? At least you’ll win a few games when it all starts again in August. Failed to […]

Oh, Bromley: Dave Roberts talks Books, Big Screens and Being Top of the League.

“I can’t answer that. Jinxes are real.” A lifetime of supporting Bromley FC has taught writer, ad-man, programme obsessive and Alan Stonebridge superfan Dave Roberts not to take the club’s remarkable start to the season for granted. Top of the National League with just one defeat in fourteen - and that coming after first-choice ‘keeper […]

Losing My Favourite Game: ‘Hammer To Fall’ with Chris Scull.

Though we might barely be two months into the new season, the nights are already drawing in, the Saturday afternoons are getting colder, and teams beginning to nestle into the comfort of midtable are already allowing their eyes to wander to that most glorious of distractions from the slog of a league campaign: the cup […]

The Size of a Cowley: The Legacy Left by Danny & Nicky, and What Their Departure Means for Lincoln City.

“You could always tell there was something special about Danny, and he was destined to go a long way, so it is no surprise to me to see him doing so well. He’s very smart. He always had a plan.” Steve King, Concord Rangers They’ve been the most talked about management duo in England’s lower […]

Losing My Favourite Game: ‘White Flags’ with Matt Abbott

Welcome back to Losing My Favourite Game, the feature that invites football fans to travel back in time to the worst days of their lives and relive them in detail for our reading pleasure. This week we’re absolutely delighted to be joined by Matt Abbot. Poet, educator, activist, and performer, Matt took his one-man show Two Little […]

The Kids Are Coming: What’s Behind The Resurgence of English Youth Prospects in the Premier League?

“You look at Under-16s or Under-17s and it’s absolutely riddled with foreign players. What chance does that give to young English players? It gives them virtually no chance.” Paul Scholes, speaking to the Daily Mail in 2015 It has become a staple of football quizzes in Britain. ‘How many non-British or Irish players started in […]

Losing My Favourite Game: ‘A Pain in the Gas’ with Sarah Ponsford.

Some defeats are instantly forgettable, others we’re able to scrunch up and file away in the deepest recesses of our memory, never to be seen again until they’re coaxed out of us by a therapist during a mid-life crisis. Some catch us cold at 11:30 on a Tuesday night as we drift off to sleep, […]

Where Do We Go From Here: Bury FC, Maidstone United, and The Long Road Back From Ruin.

On Friday 23rd August 2019, North West Tonight dedicated their 25 minute slot usually reserved for regional news to the plight of Bury FC. After 134 years in the Football League, two FA Cups and five generations of supporters, the spectre of expulsion loomed large over the club. The programme ended with a montage of supporters […]

Losing My Favourite Game: ‘Sutch Great Heights’ with Paddy from 90s Football.

According to the misattributed Winston Churchill quote, “History is written by the victors”, but coming from a man who claimed he was “strongly in favour of using poisonous gas against uncivilised tribes”, it’s fair to say old Winnie wasn’t always on the money. Flying in the face of convention, Losing My Favourite Game returns to provide the […]