The 90-Minute Nation

For more than seven decades, football has been Britain's most revealing mirror. The 90-Minute Nation traces the sport's extraordinary journey from the wreckage of the Second World War to the billion-pound spectacle of the modern Premier League, showing how football has shaped-and been shaped by-the politics, culture, and identity of postwar Britain. In a country rebuilt through resilience, conflict, reinvention, and diversity, the beautiful game became a national vocabulary through which countless social changes were expressed.

This sweeping narrative uncovers how football stadiums reflected Britain's shattered cities in the 1940s and how the terraces became spaces of identity, class, and defiance during the industrial turbulence of the 1970s. It explores the tragedies that altered national consciousness-from Heysel to Hillsborough-and the reforms that transformed stadiums into the safest and most modern in the world. As broadcasting revolutions, global ownership, and record-breaking commercialisation reshaped the sport, football emerged as one of Britain's most powerful cultural and economic forces.

From the rise of multicultural squads to the fight against racism; from the birth of the Premier League to the analytics revolution; from government interventions to fan activism and the European Super League revolt, this book charts the tight weave between society and sport. It shows how football has served as a barometer of political tension, a battleground for class and community identity, and a stage on which Britain's triumphs and failures played out in real time.

Rich in factual detail and spanning the full breadth of the modern era, The 90-Minute Nation is not merely a football history. It is the story of a country told through the sport that has mattered more to more people than any other.