A REPORTER on an Edinburgh-based magazine has produced a sports book, written mainly on his train commute between his home in Falkirk and the capital.
Henry Hepburn grew up in Aberdeen during the trophy-laden era of Sir Alex Ferguson, when manager of Aberdeen Football Club.
But the reporter on the Times Educational Supplement Scotland has delved into other sports, on a personal odyssey of what motivates the people involved.
He told allmediascotland.com, it follows a stint living in France, “where there is a more diverse sports scene”.
He continued: “I used to be obsessed with football but wanted to find out about other sports in Scotland, to find out the stories of the stars, the administrators and the coaches.”
He started writing the book three years ago, coincidentally around the time of his birth of his daughter, though he says he doesn’t know whether the two events are linked.
‘The Beautiful Games’ is self-published via the publishing platform, lulu.
Says the promotional blurb for the book: “Henry Hepburn’s growing disillusion with his one-sport country has driven him to explore what else is out there. Who are the diehards keeping their sport alive, the star players who fail to make the back pages? How perilous is their sport’s future in Scotland? And, in a country where their efforts go unheralded, why bother at all?
“The Beautiful Games illuminates a sporting nation waiting to be discovered.”
It can be purchased online, here. It costs £9.99.
