' Without football we were strangers under a shared roof. With it we were father & son.' Inspired by his father's devotion to Newcastle United & the heroes of yesteryear Duncan Hamilton brings to life a bygone age telling the story of British football from the hardscrabble 1940s & the 'never-had-it-so-good' '50s right through to the dowdy First Division of the '70s & '80s & today's slick Premiership. Hamilton recalls some of football's most sublime players managers & characters from Bill Shankly & Jackie Milburn to George Best & Lionel Messi. But at the heart of The Footballer Who could Fly is Hamilton's relationship with his own father. Here he tells how football became the only real connection between two people who apart from their love of the beautiful game were wholly different from one another.