New book celebrates Latics' forgotten triumph

A new book that celebrates Latics' forgotten triumph has been published.

It tells the story of the unique Ford Sporting League, a contest which encouraged attacking football by awarding points for every league goal scored, but deducted them when players were booked or sent off.

After it was won by Latics, they built a new (Ford) stand at Boundary Park with the prize money!

Tinpot is the story of football's lost tournaments: the strange and forgotten competitions that sparked into life before shuffling off their mortal coil.

The book tells their stories, giving them the spotlight they deserve.

It's time for something different. It's time to go somewhere new.

It's time to wander off the highways of football history and see where long-discarded paths lead.

England's major football tournaments seem to have been with us forever.

The FA Cup stretches back over 150 years, while the Football League is the oldest competition of its kind in the world.

They are the survivors - the bright ideas that quickly caught on.

Yet, behind these successes lie countless failed experiments.

But they still have their stories to tell.

Featuring over 40 forgotten football tournaments, Tinpot visits the curious world where:

• Manchester City contested a Wembley final against Chelsea only 24 hours after playing a topflight derby at Old Trafford

• Bobby Moore lined up alongside Pelé to captain a USA international side against England

• A Swansea City striker won the quest to find the nation’s fastest footballer over 100m despite suffering from a hangover

• Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester United and the rest of England’s top clubs sent their best players to compete in indoor six-a-side tournaments

• Swindon Town beat Juventus at home and away as they marched to an unlikely Anglo-Italian Cup triumph

• Watford became the first club to lose twice in the FA Cup in the same season

• A Tranmere Rovers goalkeeper conceded six goals but was still given the man of the match award

• Claudio Ranieri brought his star-studded Fiorentina side to the Potteries, but they couldn’t do it on a cold, rainy night in Stoke

• England won a trophy for once, and it wasn’t even 1966: football really did come home!

Simon Turner's previous works include If Only: An Alternative History of the Beautiful Game, a fiercely original counterfactual history of football, Walsall Match of My Life, in which Saddlers legends tell the stories behind their most memorable games and 90 Minutes from Europe, the thrilling tale of how an innovative British Airways advertising campaign foretold Walsall's greatest ever cup run.

Simon lives in Lichfield with his family.

Tinpot is a paperback book of 320 pages.

Publisher: Pitch Publishing Ltd (5 August 2024) ISBN-10: 1801507414 ISBN-13: 978-1801507417

RRP: £14.99.

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