Jelleyman's Thrown a Wobbly (Jeff Stelling)***

I actually bought this book for my boyfriend but he was working on Christmas Day (I’m not sure whether to write LMAO or AWWW but I’ll go for AWWW because I do like him quite a lot) so I started reading it and then I wouldn’t give it back to him for ages because I enjoyed it so much. It’s not a brilliant book in that it’s probably not going to appeal to people who aren’t football fans or those who don’t have the right sense of humour to appreciate the book’s comedy. But if you’re a football fan and you like jokes that are often dirty (both of which definitely apply to me), this is probably a very good book to read.

It’s not all dirty jokes. As the title suggests, most of the jokes are based on words and language rather than schoolboy sniggering. But unfortunately, there’s so much football in the book, so many incidents of grown men behaving like (extremely funny) teenage boys, this isn’t the sort of book I’d recommend to my mum, even though she really likes linguistic jokes as a rule.

And I love the way the ‘Jelleyman’ in the title of the book just happens to be Welsh footballer Gareth Jelleyman. So it actually took me a while for me to realise the connection between ‘Jelleyman’ and ‘wobbly’ because I was so excited about a Welsh footballer having his name in the title of a book. But I got it in the end.

I do have to make one big major criticism of something Jeff Stelling says at the start. The book is based on a show called Soccer Saturday, in which he and several other panellists watch football matches and when appropriate they shout and groan and try not to swear based on what they’re watching. Whenever there’s a key moment in a game, Stelling asks the relevant panellist to give a report on it. Only, you never get to see the matches – you just get to hear reactions and analysis.

Stelling says that someone who has never seen Soccer Saturday won’t appreciate the book. And this, I’m afraid, Jeff, is a load of bollocks. I have never seen Soccer Saturday in my whole life and I found the book not only comprehensible but hilarious. What’s more, I really want to watch Soccer Saturday and the only reason I don’t watch anything on Sky Sports is because my parents don’t have it. I could get it if I paid for it but it will probably take quite a lot out of my £70 a week. So maybe I’ll stick to Match of the Day, The Football League Show and Late Kick-Off, which have most of the good bits on and don’t require you to pay anything extra.

Being ignorant of Soccer Saturday was not however completely without its disadvantages. In some ways I’d have liked it if the book had taken a more chronological format. This would have given me more of an idea about how the series has progressed over time, which panellists were around at the same time, what the football situation was at that time, things like that. But on the other hand, as Stelling devotes a chapter to each regular panellist (including the ones that aren’t regular anymore), you really get the opportunity to get to know them all a little bit. And that might not have happened to the same extent if it had been chronological and all the anecdotes about them had been dotted about all over the book. But that small quibble certainly didn’t stop me from enjoying the book very much.

I would like to give it more than three stars. In terms of enjoyment it deserves more than that but I do feel this is a hilariously fun book rather than a great piece of writing. But maybe it would seem great if it was printed in a more conventional typeface. Certain fonts just look amateur which probably lowers my opinion of the writing because it’s less easy to read. And it probably would do even if it was used for Pride and Prejudice so Jeff Stelling didn’t have much of a chance.