Football has come to the ancient city of Ankh-Morpork - not the old-fashioned pushing and shoving, but the new, fast football with pointy hats for goalposts and balls that go GLOING when dropped. Now the wizards of Unseen University must win a football match without using magic, so they'll try everything else. The Big Match draws in a street urchin with a talent for kicking a tin can, a maker of jolly good pies, a dim, but beautiful young woman, and the mysterious Mr Nutt. (No one knows much about Mr Nutt, not even poor Mr Nutt.) As the match approaches, four lives are entangled and changed forever. Because the thing about football - the IMPORTANT thing about football - is that it is not just about football.