Football can be a beautiful thing. From the Dutch team of the 1970s playing their ‘total football’ to the modern tiki-taka of Guardiola’s Barcelona, the sight of 22 men kicking a piece of leather around some grass can be strangely erotic. Conversely, it can be such a monstrous thing. From Bolton’s Kevin Davies elbowing his umpeenth victim of the season to the long-ball tactics of Sam Allardyce, it can be attritional, a war of exchange. But therein lies beauty also. The fact is that footballing aesthetics are subjective, found only in the eye of the beholder. Stephen Bywater’s work of art proves that football can be simultaneously glorious and absurd, ugly and beautiful, pretentious and ordinary.

Welcome to The Art of Football.

Poetry Corner
// Being an Argyle fan is fucking rubbish…

Illustration
// Paul Scholes: An Iconic Career
// Sam Allardyce: An Iconic Career
// Patrick Vieira: An Iconic Career
// Claude Makelele: An Iconic Career
// Sir Alex Ferguson: An Iconic Career
// Dario Gradi: An Iconic Career
// Jan Koller: An Iconic Career
// Juan Sebastian Veron: An Iconic Career

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