New Zealand Soccer Referees

Soccer Football Heroes

My newest series involves those all important volunteers who make a soccer game safe and ensure fair play; the much maligned soccer referee. They’re often lucky to receive a contribution towards the cost of travelling to games; any financial consideration they earn would make the hardest working teenager pull a disgusted face. Many of them go purely for the love of the beautiful game; which is just as well because nobody ever got rich reffing grass roots soccer . They get abused and occasionally injured as players take things too far in that red haze of competition.

I grew up calling the game with the round ball – football, but our emergence on the New Zealand scene caused huge confusion as here, football involves the other shaped ball favoured by the All Blacks. We learned with great difficulty to call it soccer, although for a while the word stuck in our throats. All four of my children played and our Saturdays progressed from watching them compete in the morning and Husband in the afternoons.

As Leicester City works its way towards glory, I’m left to reflect on a time when the club was scraping its knees on the bottom of the table and financial ruin stared them in the face. My family still supported them; drove the forty minutes to their home games and cheered them on, even when the club looked to be facing its last hurrah before disappearing forever. My husband hankers after the EPL now we’re thousands of miles away but it’s a small world and there is grassroots soccer on our doorstep.

This series begins at the Auckland club, All Saints and follows the plight of Ursula Saint, recent widow and defender for the women’s team, The Priestesses. This is a romance/mystery that will drag you in and hold you harder than a winger pulling your shirt.

Take a look and see what you think. This novel is free on Amazon Prime.

Blurb

Forced to marry her wayward cousin, Ursula Saint keeps her damaging family secret. Her husband’s tragic death leaves her destitute and broken, selling her possessions and beautiful home on the Auckland north shore and moving into a rented apartment to cope with his crippling debts.

Fifth generation New Zealander, Ursula is the product of the formidable Saint family; owners of All Saints Soccer Club and winners of last year’s cup final. But there’s a rottenness at the heart of the family and the club falls victim to their bigotry and lies, threatening to drag the Saints’ good name through the churned up winter mud, amidst terrible accusations.

The Saints have rules and disobeying them draws consequences. As Ursula rises from the ashes of her empty life, she discovers passion and excitement in an unexpected place. The Saints don’t associate with referees and that’s what Teina Fox is. Ursula has broken rule number one of the Saint code.

She faces a dilemma; stop seeing the sexy referee or lose her place in the family.