Saturday, 3pm

Preface: Or, finding some things to love

1 Seeing a ground from the train
2 Watching an away end erupt
3 Getting the fixture list
4 Club shops
5 Saturday, 3pm
6 Spotting a fellow supporter elsewhere
7 Listening to the results in a car
8 Ball hitting bar
9 Pre-match routines
10 The first day of the season
11 Slide tackles in mud
12 Watching youth games in the park
13 Carrying on regardless
14 Belonging
15 Fat players
16 Jeering Passes that go out of play
17 Catering vans
18 Going with Dad
19 Jimmy Armfield's voice
20 Headers
21 Floodlights
22 Talking to an old man about football
23 Visiting a ground for the first time
24 Physiotherapist 'races'
25 Local lads 'coming through'
26 Sunday score pages
27 Shirts on a line
28 Defensive walls and drop-balls
29 Club eccentrics
30 Losing
31 Watching in bad weather
32 My daughter listening at the window
33 Singing
34 Brackets in scorelines
35 Standing on a terrace
36 When the ball goes in the crowd
37 Knowing where you are
38 Footballese
39 Time-wasting
40 Being at a junction station on matchday
41 Collectors
42 Football towns
43 Striking up a football conversation on a social occasion
44 Solid fixtures
45 Club nicknames
46 The 'hectic Christmas schedules'
47 Outfield players in goal
48 Seeing a team bus
49 Watching people get player autographs
50 The last day of the season

Acknowledgements