World of Sports: A Book for Sports Fans All Over the Globe

Description

World of Sports is your guide to one of the world's great obsessions, covering the teams, the games, the venues, the histories and the personalities that all come together to form something amazing. Matches that freeze economies. Races that stop nations. Rivalries that stretch back through centuries. This is the world of sport, electrifying and fascinating, thrilling and endlessly revealing. You can't hope to understand a nation without understanding its pastimes and passions, and that, so often, is sport. Organised into sections by world region, World of Sports features a line-up of sports, events and sporting venues that are both familiar and obscure, from world-famous match-ups to little known quirks. There's also a focus on the world's best stadiums and a calendar of sporting events. This is the ideal book for sports lovers who want to understand the full gamut of sports around the world, watch them all on TV and perhaps even travel to join the locals and share in their passion. Illustrations by UK artist Paul Reid.

Ben Groundwater is an award-winning Australian travel writer and broadcaster who has been playing and watching sport since he could first walk. Ben has been a journalist for 20 years, beginning his career working on the sports desk at the Sydney Morning Herald before shifting his focus to travel. He's since become obsessed with sporting events and sporting culture around the world, attending everything from a Boca Juniors football match at La Bombonera to a stone-lifting tournament in a Basque Country plaza. His personal career highlight was winning 'Goalkeeper of the Tournament' at the Proserpine under-12s. Ben has previously authored two books, 5 Ways to Carry a Goat (2010, UQP) and Go Your Own Way (2019, Hardie Grant Travel). In the UK you'll find the world's oldest football club, Sheffield F.C. This city is also home to the illustrator, Paul Reid. His work has featured in magazines and newspapers around the world, as well as across publishing and packaging projects. When he's not in the studio you can usually find him out walking with his dog. Or being used as a climbing frame by his two children.