Soccer Books: Review - Playing the Long Game by Christine Sinclair (with Stephen Brunt)

The all-time leading scorer's memoir hit the book shelves in time for Christmas

I’ve been fortunate to have had the opportunity to speak with Christine Sinclair several times during her career. Especially in the early part of the ‘10s, she was the voice that was always offered up by the CSA to promote what was happening.

Prior to 2012, not many were interested in hearing what Sinclair had to say, really. It’s remarkable how much has changed. No one could have possibly imagined there being a market for her memoir a decade ago. Now, an Olympic champion and the sport’s all-time international goal scoring leader, it seems weird that it took this long to be published.

That is unless you’ve ever spoken to Sinclair. In that case, it’s even more shocking that she would have provided enough information to write a paragraph, let alone an entire book.

To call Sinclair reserved is to understate just how shy/private she is. You rarely came away from a press event with her feeling that you had gained much insight into who she was.

A big part of the reason for that is that she clearly doesn’t like talking about anything that isn’t related to the football. After the infamous Olympic semi-final in 2012, that was impossible. She had become the symbol of Canadian toughness and resiliency and, as such, that’s all anyone wanted to talk about.

I remember the press conference after she was named the Canadian athlete of the year (an award that is across all sports and both genders). I was given the opportunity to ask her one question, along with about 25 other journalists on the call. As my slot came towards the end of the Q&A, I sat on the phone listening to Sinclair answer question after question of, basically, “Why are you so awesome?” or “Tell us why you are so inspiring to young girls?”

She clearly wanted to be anywhere other than on that call. It was making her very uncomfortable and, although never rude, she was not giving the journalists much to work with.

When it came time for my question, I decided to go off script a bit. Rather than asking her about her Place in Society I stuck with sports. I asked her a football question. Not just a fluffy one either. I went tactics geek and asked her about whether she felt it was time to move further back the pitch and assume more of a false 9 role, now that she was older.

You could hear the relief in her voice. This was a question she was happy to talk about. After giving 20 second answers for the last 20 or so questions, she went deep on mine, showing exactly the type of tactical understanding that you would expect from a player of Sinclair’s ability. It was insightful, interesting and made me respect her greatly as a player.

From her answer that day, it was clear that Sinclair clearly lives football. And thinks about it on a much deeper level than most (for the record, she agreed with the idea that she should be playing deeper. I’m not sure the CanWNT has always been able to give her the room to do that in the years that have followed).

If you approach Playing the Long Game with an understanding that you are not going to gain any insight into Christine Sinclair, the person, then you will likely enjoy the parts of the book where she talks about No 12.

Coming in at a light 235 pages, the book is a quick read and good blow-by-blow summary of her time with the Canadian national team. Stephen Brunt deserves a great deal of credit for finding her voice. You can hear her speaking the words as you read.

A chapter is reserved for her time at the University of Portland, and there are snippets of details about other parts of her career, but this is primarily a look at the CanWNT.

There’s not a lot in here that long-time fans of the program won’t know, but there are some good looks behind the scenes, especially from the Olympic experiences.

The highlight of the book, however, is the chapter on the 2011 World Cup and the coaching choices by Carolina Morace and staff. The stories from that experience fit into other examples of bad behaviour by women’s coaches that have come out of late (aside: if you are looking for insight into the Portland Thorns controversies in this book, keep looking. They aren’t mentioned. In fact the Thorns are barely mentioned).

Speaking about the infamous Rome camp that proceeded the disastrous 2011 World Cup, Sinclair had this to say:

I really can’t figure out why any of us thought the moving of the Canadian national team to Rome was a good idea. It blows my mind now. I don’t know why the CSA allowed it. I don’t know why, as players, we jumped on the plane and went along with it. Because it was rough.

Those of us paying attention at the time, were saying the same thing then. The problem was that there weren’t enough of us paying attention and those of us who were had limited (or no) influence.

That’s long been an issue with women’s sport, which makes it more than a little disappointing that the Thorns/NWSL abuse allegations were not part of the story Sinclair told now.

That said, what happened under Morace was not cool and the chapter detailing that time is worth reading. It is nice to see those issues finally being reported on a bigger platform than I, or others like me back then, could give them.

Overall, as a long-time observer of CanWNT, I enjoyed a look back at these tournaments, but I can’t say that I learned much that I didn’t already know. I suspect, I’m not the target audience for the book though: young girls are.

For them, this is a worthwhile read. Just don’t expect to learn anything about Sinclair the person going in. It’s a soccer-only book, just the way that Sinclair wanted it to be.

I’ll give it a 6/10 (maybe a little less for adult readers, a little more for YA readers with an interest in women’s soccer), with the Morace chapter something that fans should seek out and read.

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