“Beyond ‘Bend It Like Beckham’ serves as a great history lesson for a sport where persistent struggle has led to remarkable growth. It is a wonderfully insightful look at the development of the sport in the United States and abroad. I thoroughly enjoyed the book and would recommend it to any women’s soccer enthusiast.”—Tiffany Roberts Sahaydak, Olympic gold medalist, World Cup Champion, and co-head coach of women’s soccer at Virginia Commonwealth University
“The fascinating history of women’s soccer around the world is a story that transcends sports. . . . This important book tells the interesting story of the past, present, and future of the sport that woke up Americans to the success of Title IX during the wildly popular 1999 Women’s World Cup. But there’s much more to women’s soccer than those memorable few weeks, and Tim Grainey covers it all.”—Christine Brennan, ABC News commentator and author of Best Seat in the House
"I have long heralded Grainey as the king of knowledge on international women's soccer. While I have spent the past three years scrutinizing women's soccer in North America, Grainey has spent parts of the last three decades collecting information on the game and watching it grow up. All that culminated into a piece of literature that serves as both a compelling a read and a reference book."—Jeff Kassouf, Equalizer
"Beyond Bend It Like Beckham presents the first in-depth global analysis of the women's game—both where it has come from and where it is headed."—Total Football Magazine
"As a longtime journalist and organizer, Tim draws upon decades of experience in the sport. The story he tells is encouraging, showing how the profile of women’s soccer has grown."—Bruce Berglund, New Books in Sports