Extra Time Beckons, Penalties Loom
How to Use (and Abuse) The Language of Football: Shortlisted for Football Book of the Year at the Sports Book Awards 2025
Published on 18. September 2025
Book
Paperback/Softback
240 pages
978-1-0354-0838-2 (ISBN)
Description
SHORTLISTED FOR FOOTBALL BOOK OF THE YEAR AT THE SPORTS BOOK AWARDS 2025
LONGLISTED FOR THE WILLIAM HILL SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD
A New Statesman Book of the Year
A Sunday Times Sports Book of the Year
"A hilarious examination of the football commentary language we all understand but don't know why" WHSBOTY 2024 Reading Panel
The long-awaited follow-up to Football Cliches, Adam Hurrey's cult classic about the language of football.
"So enjoyable ... fascinating and deliciously nerdy." FourFourTwo
"Adam Hurrey is the best observer of football culture in the world. He has a knack for either encapsulating something that's always nagged at you or nailing something you can't believe you haven't noticed before." Elis James
"The funniest, smartest book on the language of football. It sends out a message, silences the doubters and lets its football do the talking ... a Rolls-Royce of a book." David Goldblatt
***
Does language evolve? Yes, it does.
Will it ever be acceptable for a football commentator to call a shot that bounces before it goes in 'a screamer'? No, it will not.
As the self-appointed world expert on the subject, Adam Hurrey sets off to define the definitive rules of the language of football.
He will answer the big questions such as: is it acceptable to say a player is 'breaking their silence' (it's complicated), can headers can be 'lashed' (anatomically impossible), whether a penalty shootout could ever be described as 'late drama' (truly abhorrent), how many games constitute a 'bumper' day of Premier League action (minimum of eight) and just how big a deficit constitutes 'a mountain to climb' (certainly not Liverpool going 1-0 down at home to Wolves in the third minute, Sky Sports).
Along the way, Hurrey examines some case studies of how the football media has reached saturation point - the transfer rumour mill, the futile art of big-match previewing, the rise of (and backlash against) football jargon - and how its language has evolved to keep the machine going.
Have we let the football lexicon spiral out of control? In finding out, this book will be exactly as gloriously pedantic as it sounds.
LONGLISTED FOR THE WILLIAM HILL SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD
A New Statesman Book of the Year
A Sunday Times Sports Book of the Year
"A hilarious examination of the football commentary language we all understand but don't know why" WHSBOTY 2024 Reading Panel
The long-awaited follow-up to Football Cliches, Adam Hurrey's cult classic about the language of football.
"So enjoyable ... fascinating and deliciously nerdy." FourFourTwo
"Adam Hurrey is the best observer of football culture in the world. He has a knack for either encapsulating something that's always nagged at you or nailing something you can't believe you haven't noticed before." Elis James
"The funniest, smartest book on the language of football. It sends out a message, silences the doubters and lets its football do the talking ... a Rolls-Royce of a book." David Goldblatt
***
Does language evolve? Yes, it does.
Will it ever be acceptable for a football commentator to call a shot that bounces before it goes in 'a screamer'? No, it will not.
As the self-appointed world expert on the subject, Adam Hurrey sets off to define the definitive rules of the language of football.
He will answer the big questions such as: is it acceptable to say a player is 'breaking their silence' (it's complicated), can headers can be 'lashed' (anatomically impossible), whether a penalty shootout could ever be described as 'late drama' (truly abhorrent), how many games constitute a 'bumper' day of Premier League action (minimum of eight) and just how big a deficit constitutes 'a mountain to climb' (certainly not Liverpool going 1-0 down at home to Wolves in the third minute, Sky Sports).
Along the way, Hurrey examines some case studies of how the football media has reached saturation point - the transfer rumour mill, the futile art of big-match previewing, the rise of (and backlash against) football jargon - and how its language has evolved to keep the machine going.
Have we let the football lexicon spiral out of control? In finding out, this book will be exactly as gloriously pedantic as it sounds.
Reviews / Votes
Analyses the language of football to the point of absurdity ... Like the podcast, the jokes never run out. A joy. * The Sunday Times Sports Books of the Year * Anyone with a taste for verbal and cultural analysis - an interest in football may help - should be grateful for the elucidating impudence of Adam Hurrey, who has turned his podcast Football Cliches into a breezy book Extra Time Beckons, Penalties Loom. * Leo Robson, New Statesman Books of the Year * Adam Hurrey is the best observer of football culture in the world. He has a knack for either encapsulating something that's always nagged at you or nailing something you can't believe you haven't noticed before. * Elis James * Football Cliches was already the funniest, smartest football podcast, and now it is the funniest, smartest book on the language of football. It sends out a message, silences the doubters and lets its football do the talking. It is what it is, and what it is, is a Rolls-Royce of a book. * David Goldblatt * So enjoyable ... fascinating and deliciously nerdy. * FourFourTwo *More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Headline Publishing Group
Product notice
Paperback (UK-B)
Dimensions
Height: 196 mm
Width: 126 mm
Thickness: 17 mm
Weight
170 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-0354-0838-2 (9781035408382)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Adam Hurrey
Extra Time Beckons, Penalties Loom
How to Use (and Abuse) The Language of Football: Shortlisted for Football Book of the Year at the Sports Book Awards 2025
E-Book
09/2024
Headline
€4.49
Available for download
Person
Adam Hurrey is a London-based football writer. He created the Football Cliches blog in 2007 while working as a TV listings editor and has since contributed articles about the unique language of football to the websites of the Guardian and the Telegraph, among others. He also had trials for Swindon Town as a youngster, but was genuinely rejected for being 'too small'.