Charlie Merrick's Misfits in Fouls, Friends, and Football

By Author / Illustrator

Dave Cousins

Genre

Real life

Age range(s)

Publisher

Oxford University Press

ISBN

9780192736598

Format

Paperback / softback

Published

01-05-2014

Synopsis

'I play for North Star Galaxy and this is the story of our first season. I don't know how it's going to end - but I hope it will be at the World Cup Finals this summer! I'm going to tell you everything that happens - the truth - however painful that might be.'Charlie loves football. He watches it, memorizes facts about it, and he's even the captain of the local youth team, North Star Galaxy.When Charlie discovers that youth teams are being selected to play in exhibition matches at the World Cup tournament later that year he decides to enter North Star. There's one problem. He's got to prove that North Star deserve a place at the tournament and that's not easy when your team are kind of rubbish at football! This book takes the form of Charlie's competition entry for his team to play a warm-up match at the World Cup - it's crammed with hilarious doodles, true facts, and match reports, and is totally accessible for boys, girls, reluctant readers, and footie-mad kids everywhere!

Reviews

Full of action, both on and off the pitch, this book is bang on target. Charlie Merrick's bunch of misfit friends love football, but they're just not very good at it. Their team, North Star Galaxy, are desperately fighting the battle against relegation in the under 12s league. Their chances don't look too good as at the start of the book they lose eleven- nil. Their fortunes turn when Charlie bribes new boy Jack to join the team as their star goalie, and the team start to win matches. Charlie's best friend Sam refuses to play, having been tricked into missing a match and replaced by Jack. Charlie starts to question if the price of winning is worth paying, when it means betraying his best friend. Meanwhile, Travis, captain of Goldbridge Colts, the arch enemies of North Star Galaxy poaches Jack for his team and it looks like relegation for sure as the Galaxy sink to the bottom of the table. Can Charlie repair the damage he's caused and rebuild some team spirit in time to save the team? The match reports, player cards, drawings, comic strips and fascinating football facts and stats help keep up the pace of the story. It should become a favourite of all football fans; both girls and boys of a wide range of ages from 8-13. It will be eagerly picked up by reluctant readers too as it looks so good, is funny and packed with a whole squad of great characters. Dave Cousins has scored a winner. 201 pages / Ages 8+ / Reviewed by Melanie Chadwick, teacher.