First Person View - Book of the Month - Reflections – When Friday Comes Football in the War Zone by James Montague

    I really enjoy these travel log style regional explorations – Simon Kuper’s Football Against the Enemy and Jonathan Wilson’s Behind the Curtain: Travels in Eastern European Football are of the same vein - and Mr. Montague has skillfully used the game of football to break down some of the walls our Western minds have put up around this complicated region.

    He’s helped make the Middle East a less-intimidating place, painting a portrait of a people more like ourselves than the average news broadcast would have you believe. Family, work, comfort, faith, and football; that is what matters to each of us. 

    We have a way of classifying things into convenient little labels, which help simplify our views of the wider world, but in reality things are always more complicated than such a rudimentary division. 

    The journey has inspired me to learn more about the troubled region; and has laid the foundations in an accessible, matter-of-fact manner.

    Given the shock award of the 2022 World Cup to Qatar, football in the Middle East will be brought into the world’s spotlight in the coming years. There’s no better way of introducing this fascinating, ancient region of the world than James Montague’s When Friday Comes: Football in the War Zone.

    Pick up a copy, you will not be disappointed.

Chapter One - Qatar
Chapter Two - Iran
Chapter Three - Iran, Saudi Arabia and the World Cup
Chapter Four - Israel
Chapter Five -  Iraq
Chapter Six - Yemen
Chapter Seven - Palestine
Chapter Eight - Egypt
Chapter Nine - West Asian Championships
Chapter Ten - Lebanon
Chapter Eleven - Syria
Chapter Twelve - Jordan