The Pies beat the Saints and the city of Melbourne was still cloaked in black and white crepe paper when the rumour of a pack rape by celebrating footballers began to surface . . . And so, as police were confiscating bedsheets from a townhouse in South Melbourne, the trial by media began.'
What does a young footballer do to cut loose? At night, some play what they think of as pranks, or games: night games with women. Sometimes these involve consensual sex, sometimes not, and often the lines are blurred.
In Night Games , Anna Krien follows the rape trial of an Australian Rules footballer. She also takes a balanced and fearless look at the dark side of footy culture – the world of Sam Newman, Ricky Nixon, Matty Johns and the Cronulla Sharks.
Both a courtroom drama and a riveting work of narrative journalism, this is a breakthrough book by one of the leading young lights of Australian writing.
Night Games was shortlisted for the Walkley Book Award 2013 and the Adelaide Festival Award for Non-Fiction 2014.
'The work of a compassionate and expansive intelligence.' The Sydney Morning Herald