Before You Go: Lower League Life and Love at the Lamex
John Aizlewood
Regular price £14.99
From the publisher:
Before You Go is a love story between father and son – of their love of football and of Stevenage FC.
By award-winning author, journalist and broadcaster John Aizlewood.
This compelling book offers a unique, fresh adventure into the heart and soul of lower-league football, as seen through the eyes of a vastly experienced, well-travelled football writer and his teenage son:
- John and his 14-year-old son, Oscar, attend every Stevenage FC – aka Boro – game of the 2024/25 season, home and away, league and cups, the narrative flowing from Stevenage FC’s season
- They travel by car, train and coach – and they explore every location they visit, whether they’re eating Blackpool’s finest fish’n’chips or smelling Rotherham’s indoor market
- They stand on the grave of a queen, they shout themselves hoarse, they gaze in wonder at team buses, they marvel at Stonehenge, squabble about tactics and about each other, and they eat too many culinarily challenged pies
- The book provides a cultural snapshot of England (and Wrexham) in 2024 and ’25 – the fixture list decides where they go, but each location has its own story
Before You Go is not only the saga of a season in the life of the smallest club in League One. It’s also the story of a father and son bonding and sharing their lives through football, before Oscar takes his GCSEs and goes on to become a man and before John moves, rather more reluctantly, into later life.
The author:
Before You Go is John Aizlewood’s fifth book. Previously the author of Love Is The Drug, Playing At Home, Decades: Joy Division + New Order and Radiohead: Life In A Glasshouse, John has written about sport for more than 20 years for the nation’s most prestigious newspapers. He currently writes for a host of publications including The Times/Sunday Times, Daily/Sunday Telegraph, the i paper, Radio Times, Mojo and Classic Rock.
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Pitch Publishing
22 x 15 cm
Hardback
336 pages
September 2025
English
9781836800224