“I never intended to write this Book, no more than I intended to do the Quiz on which it is based!

Back in 1987, I helped form Avon Arsenal Football Club, an adult team playing in Division 5 of the Bath & District Sunday League. In our 3rd season, for some strange reason, I decided to produce a programme which we sold to our players, the opposition players and, if we were lucky, the few spectators who turned up to watch.

The team ceased in the early 2000s, but many players kept in touch and in 2013 the Avon Arsenal Facebook Group was created. It took me another 6 years to make my first post on the group, in the spring of 2020. I was 57, now living in the USA, and the world was being locked down due to COVID-19. Gathering dust in my garage, I came across my old Avon Arsenal programmes, which miraculously, I had kept for nearly 30 years, even surviving a trip across the Atlantic.

I thought it would be nice to post the programmes on Facebook and, for a bit of fun, I thought I would ask a few questions about them. I could not have foreseen what would transpire – for the next 3 months the Quiz seemed to develop a life of its own. I loved every bit of it; it was truly one of the best times of my life!

On the last day of the Quiz, I had the idea of writing a Book, Avon Arsenal The Quiz. I hope you enjoy reading it, and taking part in the Quiz, as much as I have enjoyed writing it!”

© Andrew Slade