Barney Ronay is an English journalist and author. He is the chief sports writer for ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'', and has regularly appeared on ''The Guardian''s '' Football Weekly'' podcast and at the ''Football Weekly'' live shows. Ronay has written for the ''

New Statesman The ''New Statesman'' is a British Political magazine, political and cultural magazine published in London. Founded as a weekly review of politics and literature on 12 April 1913, it was at first connected with Sidney Webb, Sidney and Beatrice ...

'',''

When Saturday Comes ''When Saturday Comes'' (''WSC'') is a monthly magazine about football, first published in London in 1986. "It aims to provide a voice for intelligent football supporters, offering both a serious and humorous view of the sport, covering all the ...

'', ''

The Cricketer ''The Cricketer'' is a monthly English cricket magazine providing writing and photography from international, county and club cricket. The magazine was founded in 1921 by Sir Pelham Warner, an ex-England captain turned cricket writer. Warner ...

'', and ''

The Blizzard "The Blizzard" (or The Snow Storm) (russian: Мете́ль, ''Metél' '') is the second of five short stories that constitute ''The Belkin Tales'' by Alexander Pushkin. The manuscript for the story was originally completed October 20, 1830. It wa ...

''. Ronay has written several books. ''How Football (Almost) Came Home: Adventures in Putin's World Cup'' was published by HarperCollins in November 2018. ''The Manager: The Absurd Ascent of the Most Important Man in Football'', was published in 2010 and was named book of the week by ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...

'', ''Any Chance of a Game? A Season at the Ugly End of Park Football'' was published in 2006. He also co-authored the ''WSC Companion to Football''. Ronay was a highly influential campaigner against plans by

Lewisham Lewisham () is an area of southeast London, England, south of Charing Cross. It is the principal area of the London Borough of Lewisham, and was within the historic county of Kent until 1889. It is identified in the London Plan as one of ...

council that he felt could harm

Millwall FC Millwall Football Club () is a professional football club in Bermondsey, South East London, England. They compete in the EFL Championship, the second tier of English football. Founded as Millwall Rovers in 1885, the club has retained its name ...

. In 2014, he was named the 29th most influential

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

user in UK football. On 10 October 2018 Ronay was included in a list of the 238 most respected journalists working in Britain as published by the

National Council for the Training of Journalists The National Council for the Training of Journalists (NCTJ) was founded in 1951 as organisation to oversee the training of journalists for the newspaper industry in the United Kingdom and is now playing a role in the wider media. It is a self-ap ...

. On 31 October 2018 it was announced that Ronay had been nominated in the ‘writer of the year’ category at the 2018

Football Supporters Federation The Football Supporters' Federation (FSF) is an organisation representing football fans in England and Wales. It campaigns across a range of issues and supports fan representation on clubs' boards, lower ticket prices, and the introduction of sa ...

Awards, which he subsequently won ahead of

Jonathan Liew Jonathan Liew (born 1985) is a sports writer for ''The Guardian''. Liew has been named the sports writer of the year, and sports columnist of the year, at the annual SJA Awards. Journalism career Liew started in 2009 on the '' Daily Telegraph'' ...

and Jonathan Northcroft amongst others. At the 2020 Sports Journalists’ Association awards Ronay was named best football journalist. Ronay and Liew have written a TV series called '' The Red Zone'' which was set to be shown on

Netflix Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fi ...

in 2021, executive produced by Sam Mendes. However, in March 2022 the project was announced as discontinued. In November 2022 he won ‘writer of the year’ at the

Football Supporters' Association The Football Supporters' Association (The FSA) is the national, democratic, representative body for football supporters in England and Wales. They are the leading advocates for supporter ownership, better fan engagement, cheaper ticket prices, t ...

awards.

Personal life

Ronay was born and raised in South East London, and is of Austrian and

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

descent, whose grandparents fled during the rise of the Nazis in Austria. He was educated at

Oxford University Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to th ...

. He is a supporter of

Tottenham Hotspur Tottenham Hotspur Football Club, commonly referred to as Tottenham () or Spurs, is a professional football club based in Tottenham, London, England. It competes in the Premier League, the top flight of English football. The team has playe ...

References

English sports journalists English podcasters English male non-fiction writers Journalists from London British Jews 21st-century English male writers The Guardian journalists {{UK-journalist-stub