Book review: Injury Time, by David Goldblatt

Injury Time – Football in a State of Emergency, by David Goldblatt; published by Mudlark; price: £22

Acclaimed football historian David Goldblatt’s new book is a wide-ranging examination of contemporary society through the lens of football.

Injury Time explores Brexit, Covid, and the current ‘polycrisis’ (climate change, economic instability, and political conflict) through the prism of football.

It posits the game as the most illuminating guide to the state of the nation today.

Role of football

Goldblatt’s belief is that current world problems have their own football equivalent, be it the rise of inequality in the professional game, the poor state of grassroots finances and pitches, the disaster capitalism of the European Super League, or the rise and fall of Russian club ownership.

Or indeed the steady rise in the number of football pitches and matches lost to extreme weather.

Football has seeped into our public debates. From Marcus Rashford’s campaign against child hunger to the reactions to Gary Lineker’s tweet about the Tory Government’s anti-migrant rhetoric.

Football has become the ultimate bellwether for British society.

Goldblatt argues that racist abuse around football and in society in general have both been on the increase.

He believes the combination of xenophobia, nativism, and rage conjured up during the Brexit referendum and the victory of the Leave campaign has translated into the normalisation of acts of hatred.

It is hard to overstate the role football now plays in modern culture.

He makes the case that football has now overtaken Coronation Street and all the other soap operas as the country’s primary soap opera.

Football has become the last bastion of must-see appointment television.

For example, England’s defeat to Italy in the final of Euro 2020 was watched by 31 million on TV and 11m online. That made it the most-viewed event in British television history.

The game’s soul

He further observes that football is now increasingly controlled by two distinct factions. There are American finance houses and nation states such as Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.

The Club World Cup typifies the depressing state in which football finds itself.

It is a tournament designed to benefit only a handful of teams, in an already packed calendar, bankrolled (indirectly) by Saudi money.

Goldblatt concludes his analysis of football’s problems by examining the sport’s refusal to confront the climate crisis and make the changes required.

His assessment of the state of football’s soul and Britain’s in general is a bleak one.

He believes the game is unable to rid itself of racism and hooked on get-rich-quick schemes. It is willing to sell anything and everything for the right price to the wrong buyer.

It’s hard to argue with the strong case he makes that football is in a crisis of its own making.

Ian Aspinall

Rating: 9/10

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