The Coping Stone

<p><strong style=color: rgba(20 20 20 1)><em>The Coping Stone-The First English Soccer Tour of Australia 1925</em> </strong><span style=color: rgba(20 20 20 1)>tells the little-known but fascinating story of how soccer fought for survival - and acceptance - in early 20th-century Australia. </span></p><p></p><p><span style=color: rgba(20 20 20 1)>In a sporting landscape dominated by rugby and Australian Rules football was kept alive in the mining towns of New South Wales and Queensland fuelled by the passion of working-class migrants. </span></p><p></p><p><span style=color: rgba(20 20 20 1)>Through the intertwined lives of miner-turned-international 'Judy' Masters young Australian administrator Syd Storey a traditional English administrator John Lewis and visiting Arsenal player Tom Whittaker Paul Nicholls brings to life a time when the world's most popular sport struggled for legitimacy in a country where it was seen as a foreign game. From the trenches of the Western Front to the coalfields of the Illawarra and the packed grounds of Sydney this is a story of resilience ambition and the long journey to secure the coping stone - a historic tour by an English team that promised to cement football's place in the Australian sporting landscape.</span></p><p></p><p><span style=color: rgba(20 20 20 1)>Set against the backdrop of the roaring twenties and featuring a gun-toting hotel manager a breakaway professional league and a mysterious robbery </span><strong style=color: rgba(20 20 20 1)><em>The Coping Stone</em></strong><span style=color: rgba(20 20 20 1)> is an extraordinary tale of the first English soccer tour of Australia. </span></p><p></p>