Shelley Webb

Shelley Webb is a British TV presenter, writer, and sports journalist and author of the book Footballers' Wives Tell Their Tales. The book was the basis of the ITV series Footballers' Wives, which was an "enormous hit."[1]

Personal life

Webb married former England footballer Neil Webb, and the couple had two children Luke and Josh, who both became professional footballers.[2] Webb's father was a professional footballer, and she has been a fan since childhood.[3] She was a university student when she and Neil met.[3] They married when she was 21.[3]

Career

Webb, who holds a first-class honours degree in English and History, trained as a journalist before her marriage and resumed that career with the local Nottingham Evening Post, working as an occasional sports writer. She was forced to turn down a job as a radio broadcaster in Nottingham when Neil Webb moved form Nottingham Forest to Manchester United.[4] She later moved to TV presenting.[4][5] She worked as an on-air journalist for Standing Room Only (TV series), then for BBC World Service Television.[4]

This professional visibility led to interviews about her life as a footballer's wife, and, eventually, led her to write the book Footballers' Wives Tell Their Tales in 1998,[6] the year she and Neil split up.[7]

Her Footballers' Wives looked at the reality of being a modern footballer's wife.[8][9] Webb interviewed 14 of her fellow footballer's wives for her 1998 book, painting what The Daily Telegraph called "a dismal picture of chronic insecurity, upheaval, boredom and loneliness."[10]

The book was the basis for a TV series Footballers' Wives, a series that portrayed the lives of footballers and their families in the years when they became "like pop stars", receiving a level of coverage that the Scotsman described as "even sillier" than fan enthusiasm, as well as offers of sex and a lack of privacy.[5]

References
  1. Ryan, Andrew (4 August 2006). "Tune in, turn on and enjoy the trip". The Globe and Mail. ProQuest 383515529.
  2. Bosley, Sarah (13 August 2009). "FA Cup winners medal goes under the hammer". Newbury Today.
  3. Bernard, Peter (29 January 1996). "A game of two halves on and off the pitch". The Times of London. ProQuest 318060136.
  4. Redding, Mark (6 December 1996). "Webbs crossed As Neil Webb turns out in the twilight world of non-League football, his wife is presenting a new radio show". The Guardian. ProQuest 245085961.
  5. Smith, Aidan (7 January 2002). "Off the ball". The Scotsman. Archived from the original on 25 July 2018.
  6. "Footballers' wives - the shocking truth". BBC News Online. 5 October 1998.
  7. Kimmage, Paul (28 November 2004). "The Big Interview: Neil Webb". Times Online.
  8. Mott, Sue (27 September 1998). "How the inside halves survive (Book review)". Scotland on Sunday. ProQuest 326496200.
  9. Pizzichini, Lilian (25 October 1998). "Paperback Roundup (short book review)". The Independent. ProQuest 312743088.
  10. "The Home Team". The Daily Telegraph. 13 January 2002. Retrieved 2 August 2016.


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