Offsider - a Memoir

In the 1970s, growing up in rural Australia as a young English immigrant was a dangerous game, especially if you were mad about the sport unkindly labelled 'wogball'. In Offsider Patrick Mangan describes his long and perilous journey from the suburbs of London to country Victoria to the MCG, from Big Ben to bulbous Mallee skies and beyond. All while bearing the stigma of his hapless, relegation-bound Arsenal. Like a Fever Pitch set among gum trees and dust, it's the story of a frail Pommy kid's passion for the world game, his epic battle to convert the pagans of the outback to the cause, and, presaging a future in sports journalism, the building of a publishing empire-producing Ballarat's most popular soccer magazine ever made by 12-year-olds (circulation: six). Offsider is about how sport defines us, how nationality defines us. It's about how Australia became, at least in the eyes of one fan, a football nation.