Andy Ward (1950-2022)

Andrew Ward was the author or co-author of almost 30 sports books, including Football Nation (with John Williams, 2009), Kicking and Screaming (with Rogan Taylor, 1995) and Armed with a Football (1994). He co-edited The Day of the Hillsborough Disaster (1995) and helped to create Anova’s Strangest series with books on football, cricket, horse-racing, golf and bridge. His work in higher education included What Use is a Degree? (with Alan Jenkins and Lynn Jones, 2002) and ‘The Writing Process’ in Doing Academic Research (Open University, 1998). As an RLF Fellow he helped to set up a residential writing course for PhD students at the University of Wales (Aberystwyth). As a project fellow he co-developed a resource for thesis-writers and other academics.

In The Birth Father’s Tale (British Association for Adoption and Fostering, 2012) Andrew Ward told how losing a child to the adoption process impacted upon his career choices, relationships and attitudes. It explained why he became a specialist in follow-up studies, life-stories and narrative, working for a time as a university careers counsellor. Andy Ward had a BA in sociology and statistics and an MSc in the sociology of sport. His early career included work as a statistician and market researcher. While working on The Birth Father’s Tale he began a social-history project with Professor Tim Newburn of the LSE.