Andrew Stephen’s The Season That Really Was – the story of Cambridge United’s 2025-26 promotion season – is getting excellent reviews on Amazon and the national press. The following review appears this week in Late Tackle:
A YEAR ago, Andrew Stephen unveiled The Season That Nearly Was, chronicling Cambridge United’s 2024-25 campaign.
It’s fair to say the original plan wasn’t to cover a relegation season, but that was unfortunately the way it turned out as the U’s fell through the trapdoor to League Two.
Fast forward 12 months and we now have The Season That Really Was, giving us a run through United’s 2025-26 programme – and, thankfully, this time there is a happy ending as the U’s bounce straight back to the third tier.
A large chunk of the book is taken up by previews and reports of the U’s matches throughout the season. The reports aren’t blow-by-blow accounts of what happened, but nicely written overviews, which complement the previews.
As with his previous effort, Stephen throws in a whole load of extra material to give the book a fine all-round feel. For example, there are some excellent accounts from a variety of Cambridge fans as to what the club means to them, short chapters on the fans’ trust Cambridge Fans United and the shadow board, plus the author’s favourite 11 U’s players down the years.
The U’s director of football Mark Bonner has also penned a nice foreword about what the club means to the whole community.
Whether this is the ‘best book ever written about lower league football’, as claimed on the back page, is up for debate, but there is no doubt that Cambridge United fans will adore it.
The question now is whether there will be another book in a year’s time?
John Lyons
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We can answer the question posed in your final paragraph, John. The answer is a resounding Yes!
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