“A revolutionary text that challenges everything we thought we knew about the beautiful game’s origins.”
Soccer Books UK
The Game That Would Be King arrives as a revolutionary text that challenges everything we thought we knew about the beautiful game’s origins.
Soccer Books UK
Brendan Murphy’s new book, The Game That Would Be King: The Uncharted History of Soccer 800-1800 AD was published by Meyer & Meyer in December 2025. The book takes the reader on a journey through history, tracing the origins of soccer from its humble beginning to an established sport beloved worldwide. It is a story that spans five thousand years, from ancient Egypt to MesoAmerica, from the Greek Empire to Chinese Dynasties, and from the Roman Empire to medieval Britain. From the Middle Ages onwards, Britain and Ireland unfurl their lineage, from the lesser-known trapball and stoolball to the lamentably extinct camping and knappan. All forms find a voice in this book, as do hockey and hurling, baseball and bowling, tennis and golf. Primarily a narrative of British and Irish ball games, esteemed foreigners are welcomed: baggataway, knattleikur, soule, kolven, calcio. Many games come to life, revealing their motivations, and their complex inner world. Still, soccer is firmly centre stage. This is, after all, its picaresque journey. As the games sweep across history, the social, religious, and political contexts are threaded throughout, and this book is peppered with news snippets, anecdotes, comedy, and intrigue, which gift the centuries life. Crammed with eccentric sports ephemera, untold tales, and unearthed facts, The Game That Would Be King is the most comprehensive work on the early history of ball games ever written.
Brendan Murphy
The Irish Post
Murphy traces a family tree of games long forgotten . . . Soccer remains centre stage, but the wider cast gives the book its colour, strangeness and charm.
Soccer Books UK
This meticulously researched volume doesn’t just push back the timeline of soccer’s history, it explodes it.
Irish America
Packed with oddities, anecdotes and ephemera.
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BLOG: HELLGATE WINS BEST FEATURE SCRIPT AT THE LIVERPOOL INDIE AWARDS 2026
A nobleman squanders his vast inheritance to earn the approval of his father. When he realises he prefers the simple life, a tragedy changes everything.
Set in Cork and London at the end of the eighteenth century, Hellgate, is based on the life of the dissolute Earl of Barry & his eccentric family. It is a picaresque story of a young man’s ennui and outrageous excesses in an aristocratic society devoid of meaning.
From Sheffield With Love
Known simply as the Club, Sheffield FC was 150 years old on 24 October 1857. Brendan Murphy traces its birth and the growth of football in the city, which can justly claim to have given organised football to the world.
Sheffield was the world-leader in innovative football firsts. The city introduced corner kicks, the one-man offside rule, heading, the use of crossbars, penalty kicks, indirect free kicks, free kicks for handball, the first knockout football competition, and the world’s first football trophy.
A fascinating read, brilliantly researched, about a club whose heyday was well over 100 years ago. Well done to both the author for his research, and also local publisher SportsBooks for having the courage to bring out such a book. Peter Matthews, BBC Online
A tribute to the part played by sons of the city in the development of the world’s most popular sport. Bill Bridge, Yorkshire Post Online
As a Sheffield man, I’m delighted to see my hometown get the recognition it deserves for its role in the history of football. Geoff Thompson OBE, Chairman of the Football Association, 1999-2008. Former Vice-President of FIFA and UEFA
There can be few genuine fans of the game that are unaware of the club’s unique position in the history of the game. By reading this book, however, I certainly learnt a deal about the early years and development of our national sport and the part that the city of Sheffield played. It is a fascinating read. Richard Caborn, Minister for Sport, 2001-2007.
