THE GHOSTS OF INCHMERY ROAD by Mat Guy
Sometimes, after a night match, once the crowds and players have gone and the floodlights snap off, they come out once more: swaying crowds on the terraces looking on expectantly, silently applauding at long-gone players in oversized shirts and shorts, passing and running, chasing the ball across the pitch. People, for whom it meant just as much as it does to us today. They dissolve back into darkness. Then the nightwatchman starts on his rounds.
The nightwatchman (or woman) guards not just the football ground but also the soul of the club that is at the heart of the town and has done so for a century or more. They preserve and tell the stories that make the club more than just a football team on the road to nowhere: stories of deaths and births, of tragedy and joy echoing down the years – the ghosts of the past that will never leave this sacred place. Charlie Truckle’s tenure is coming to an end – what will happen to the Town’s legacy then?
(Publisher: 1889 Books. October 2023. Paperback: 216 pages)
Buy the book here: The Ghosts of Inchmery Road