World of Football by Michael Hurley

A brand new series offering high interest facts, statistics, photographs and features covering the 2010 World Cup and great World Cup stars and moments up to the present day. Includes information on the teams taking part in the 2010 World Cup. Provides comprehensive coverage of the World Cup and its place in soccer's history and future.

this book has been kindly sent to myself and my son by Michael from the My Child forum (http://www.mychild.co.uk/forum)
the book contains many large, high quality photographs of many players, both past and present.
There are a number of sections/chapters to the book which explain the history of both the game of football and also the introduction of the world cup to the world,football around the world, explaining both the english premiership as well as the USA major league soccer, womens football and football fans around the world. There are many interesting facts within the text and touches on many topics and would be a great book for anyone interested in football and wants a general guide to the history of the game, leaving them many oppurtunities to further research specific topics later. There is also a useful section in the back which details the markings on a football pitch, aswell as descriptions of the main five positions a footballer may play in.

there is a comprehensive glossary at the end of the book and a couple of suggestions of books for further reading and websites.

This book would be ideal for a child who had began to show an interest in football, however i do think that there is a limit to the amount of information given within the book. i only have a limited knowledge of football (although i am learning as my son has discovered match attack cards and match of the day on a sunday morning) and i was aware of quite a few competitions from around the world not included or football stars which were not included (only three were included and i had heard of only Cristiano Ronaldo), however it would have been difficult to choose which football starts to include. i believe the book could have been extended to include a few more details to give a true reflection of football as a game and not concentrate on 'football stars', which could give the book a shorter shelf life.
I do think this is a great book for children to extend their interest in football and would recommend the book to them, however if you want to know about current football players or a more detailled read than a gerneral overview other books of the market may be better choices.
thank you again to michael for sending me this book.