The Striker and the Clock

(Paperback)

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An exhilarating and searing memoir about life as a professional female footballer - and a beautiful examination of the joy and pain of serious athletics

Riveting ... A paean to the beautiful game Los Angeles Times

A compelling debut Times Literary Supplement

In The Striker and the Clock, Georgia Cloepfil tells the story of her life in football: the triumph, the exhilaration, the deep bonds between teammates, and also the years of self-denial, exile and dedication, in which players try in vain to outpace a clock that ticks down toward an indeterminate ending.

What emerges is a profound meditation on what it is to have a body, and what it is to have the compulsion to push it to do the near impossible; and a love letter to the motivations, joys, pains and desires of a beautiful game.

Reviews

Will appeal to readers ready and willing to embrace the deep affinities among the craft and discipline of sport An allusive, self-aware, culturally aware and, above all, thoughtful book * TLS *
A book of uncommonly honest insight, full of wisdom won not through adulation but persistence * WASHINGTON POST *
Georgia Cloepfil has written a nimble, breathtaking book about the beautiful game, and about her beautiful, brutal life playing it. It reveals so much about the strange, hard path of a young woman pursuing a career as a professional soccer player, but it is far more interesting than an ordinary story of passion, promise, setback, and success. It is, instead, a cleareyed exploration of what passion, promise, setback, and success even mean -- Louisa Thomas, sportswriter for the New Yorker
Riveting ... A paean to the beautiful game, the book chronicles how Cloepfil overcame adversity to strike joy * LOS ANGELES TIMES *
Former footballer Georgia Cloepfil offers a unique and fascinating insight into the mind of a professional athlete in this memoir. Written in 90 minute long passages, Cloepfil covers the joys of camaraderie, the agony of injury, and what it means to push yourself to your absolute limits in pursuit of what can inevitably only ever be time-limited excellence * EVENING STANDARD *
With the deft and determined movements of a seasoned player, Georgia Cloepfil writes about what it means to endure and what it means to leave a sport behind. In her first book, The Striker and the Clock, Cloepfil examines her elusive ambitions and redirected energies -- Leanne Shapton, author of Swimming Studies
This book introduced me to the poetry of soccer and the humble nomad that is the professional female soccer player. Cloepfils accomplishments and sacrifices while on the clock left me inspired; her talent on the page has me in awe -- Courtney Maum, author of The Year of the Horses
As poetic as anything youll read on the early days of pro womens soccer, on the joys and grim realities of an athletes life, on pain tolerance, on the art of sportswriting itself Cloepfils writing helps readers understand why certain athletes, their brains and marriages falling apart, won't just retire * DEFECTOR *
Georgia Cloepfil is that rare athlete who can write well about their sport and their passion In ninety sharp entries mirroring the ninety minutes of play, Cloepfil captures what its like to fight so hard to play the game you love * PARADE *

This book is for anyone who has ever loved something with everything they had, anyone who has ever turned themselves over to glory, joy, and worship. A necessary and long-awaited entry into the literary sports canon, The Striker and the Clock is a transcendent love affair and an act of devotion

-- Marisa Crane, author of I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself
With swift and elegant prose, Georgia Cloepfil has written not merely a contemplation on sport and the sporting life, but rather a lyrical exploration on the myriad ways to move forward be it toward a goal, a dream, that dream's end, or toward a glimpse of the sublime itself. The Striker and the Clock serves as a poignant reminder that both art and sport can gift us fleeting encounters with the extraordinary -- Chlo Cooper Jones, author of Easy Beauty

Author Bio

Georgia Cloepfil is a writer and a womens soccer coach. Cloepfil became infatuated with soccer as a child and throughout her twenties played on womens professional and semi-professional teams all over the world, from Korea to Australia to Sweden. Her work has appeared in the New York Times Magazine, Washington Post and the Yale Review, as well as many other publications. The Striker and the Clock was shortlisted for the 2022 Graywolf Nonfiction Prize.

georgiacloepfil.com