Alyson Rudd plays football for both men's and women's teams, but is probably the last remnant of an era where a girl who loved football was not allowed to play it. Instead she had to learn the hard way - as an adult among cynical blokes. Now, just sometimes, you cannot tell how many of those formative years she missed.

Astroturf Blonde charts the pain and the glory as she searches for a sweet left-footed drive into the top corner that Ryan Giggs would be proud of. From her unique standpoint, she offers a remarkable insight into the (almost) all-male team talks, and their all-female equivalents, as well as taking the rader into the changing room, into the thick of the action and to the heart of her obsession.

Her football may be bottom-rung soccer, played in London's parks, or in fields strewn with goose droppings or on ageing Astroturf pitches, but she reveals a real passion and commitment that draw together her team-mates, but also attract the odd sociopath. She also tells us how much fun and laughter is to be had during and after a game on a wet and windy Tuesday evening in January when she could be curled up warm on a sofa at home.

The book is a celebration of park football, as enjoyed by over a million people nationwide, and the hopes and fears of those who play it. The Blonde has dreams too, and, incredibly, some of them come true.