Todd Smith on Relegated and Life in the Football Pyramid

Todd Smith, author of Relegated: One American’s Pints and Pies Journey from the Top to the Bottom of the English Football World, joins Chris Horwedel on The Beautiful Game: Unfiltered for a conversation about the culture, communities and people that make English football unlike anything else in sports.

Smith explains how a lifelong connection to soccer eventually became an ambitious journey through the British football pyramid, taking him beyond the Premier League and into clubs and towns where promotion, relegation and matchday traditions are woven deeply into everyday life.

The conversation explores the inspiration behind Relegated, the experience of traveling through English, Scottish and Welsh football as “Todd from America,” and what he discovered about fandom when he stopped watching from a distance and began experiencing the game alongside the people who live it every week.

Todd also discusses his life as a writer, the unlikely road that brought the book together, and why the promotion-and-relegation system creates a relationship between clubs and supporters that can be difficult for American sports fans to fully appreciate until they experience it themselves.

It’s a conversation about football, travel, storytelling, community, and why some of the sport’s most meaningful stories exist far away from its biggest stadiums.

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