Rugby League football in an industrial northern city circa 1960

is a life of grime, mud, sweat, intrigue and naked ambition. In This Sporting Life, David Storey recounts the fortunes of gladiator hero Arthur Machin from the day of his inclusion in the local team to the match when he begins to feel age creeping up on him.

Through Arthur we are taken into his raw, often brutal world of players, backers, Saturday crowds bloody noses and broken teeth, landladies and communal baths.