The Legends of Aston Villa 1874-2007

Tony Matthews was born and bred in the Black Country and wrote his first football book in 1974. Almost 100 more have followed since, including six on Aston Villa: The Complete Record (1874-1988, updated in 1992), The Complete Encyclopaedia of Aston Villa (1874-2001), Images of Sport - Aston Villa FC (2003) and two entitled the Who's Who of Aston Villa (the first in 1989, the second in 2004). Educated at Christ Church and George Salter schools in West Bromwich, he was an amateur footballer at The Hawthorns, played in Switzerland for Lucerne and had spells with both Coventry City and Shrewsbury Town before working as a sports master at a Birmingham preparatory school for 10 years. He has competed in and finished two marathons, run a football programme/ memorabilia shop in Birmingham, started the West Bromwich Albion museum and at one time (in the mid-1980s) had a personal collection of one million football programmes.