Steven Kim Book (born 7 July 1969) is an English former professional

football goalkeeper Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

who is currently employed as the goalkeeping coach at

Cheltenham Town Cheltenham Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in the town of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England. From the 2021–22 season, the club compete in League One, the third tier of the English football league syst ...

. Book represented a number of clubs in the English

football league system Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

during a career which began in 1988 at Welton Rovers and concluded with a two-year stint as player-goalkeeping coach at

between 2010 and 2012. He then retired from playing to focus on coaching at Cheltenham Town.

Early career

The son of a former professional goalkeeper, Kim Book, and nephew of the former

Manchester City Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The tw ...

manager

Tony Book Anthony Keith Book (born 4 September 1934) is an English retired footballer and manager. Book spent a large part of his career in Non-League football with his home town club Bath City, before entering league football with Plymouth Argyle. At the ...

, Steve began his career on the South-West non-league circuit with clubs such as

Paulton Rovers Paulton Rovers Football Club is an English football club based at the First 4 Pools Stadium on Winterfield Road in the growing village of Paulton near Bristol. They were established in 1881 and currently play in the Southern Football League Div ...

, Welton Rovers, Frome Town and

Weston-super-Mare Weston-super-Mare, also known simply as Weston, is a seaside town in North Somerset, England. It lies by the Bristol Channel south-west of Bristol between Worlebury Hill and Bleadon Hill. It includes the suburbs of Mead Vale, Milton, Oldmixon ...

. He moved on to

Bath City Bath City Football Club is a semi-professional football club based in Bath, Somerset, England. The club is affiliated to the Somerset FA and currently competes in the National League South, the sixth tier of English football. The club have ...

and spent the initial part of the 1993/4 at

Brighton Brighton () is a seaside resort and one of the two main areas of the City of Brighton and Hove in the county of East Sussex, England. It is located south of London. Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze A ...

without breaking into the first team though he did make a couple of appearances for

Slough Town Slough Town Football Club is a semi-professional English football club based in Slough, Berkshire. Nicknamed "The Rebels", the team competes in the National League South, at the sixth tier of English football, following promotion from the Sou ...

whilst on loan there. A change of management saw him return to the non-league scene with Frome Town before a period at Lincoln City where he was an unused substitute in a couple of League Cup ties in the 1994/95 season.

Forest Green Rovers

In September 1994 he joined

Forest Green Rovers Forest Green Rovers Football Club are a professional football club based in Nailsworth, Gloucestershire, England. The team compete in , the third tier of the English football league system, and have played their home games at The New Lawn since ...

. Although his number of appearances are unknown, he spent three years at the Nailsworth club before an £8,000 transfer took him to

in July 1997.

Cheltenham Town

He was the first choice goalkeeper at Cheltenham for seven years, leading them to promotion into the League, a F A Trophy win, then into Nationwide Division 2 via the playoffs in 2002. His career at Cheltenham also seen him win England semi-pro honours and The Conference Team of the year 98–99. He left Cheltenham in the summer of 2004 and joined

Swindon Town Swindon Town Football Club is a professional football club based in Swindon, Wiltshire, England. The team currently competes in , the fourth tier of the English football league system. The club has played home matches at the County Ground sin ...

Swindon Town, Bristol Rovers and Non-League

In July 2005, and without a professional club, the Emerson's Green-based Book linked up with

Bristol Rovers Bristol Rovers Football Club are a professional football club in Bristol, England. They compete in League One, the third tier of the English football league system. They play home matches at the Memorial Stadium in Horfield, they have been c ...

for training and also to assist coaching the club's younger goalkeepers. On 16 August 2005 he was appointed goalkeeping coach at

on a permanent basis, succeeding

Phil Kite Phil Kite (born 26 October 1962) is a former football goalkeeper, goalkeeping coach and physiotherapist. He retired in 2015 from his role as physio at Bristol Rovers, the club he supported as a boy. Playing career Born in Bristol, England, K ...

in the role to allow Kite to concentrate fully on his role as physio. Book combined his coaching role with a playing role with Cirencester Town, debuting for the club in the 2–0

Southern Football League Premier Division The Southern League is a men's football competition featuring semi-professional clubs from the South and Midlands of England. Together with the Isthmian League and the Northern Premier League it forms levels seven and eight of the English foot ...

victory at Chesham United on 13 August 2005. He made twelve league appearances for the club, the final one in a 1–0 defeat at

Aylesbury United Aylesbury United Football Club is a football club based in Chesham, Buckinghamshire, England. They are currently members of Division One Central of the Southern League and play at Chesham United's Meadow ground, having been evicted from their ...

on 22 November 2005, before leaving the club and signing non-contract terms with

where he was given the squad number 25. As a player, he joined Mangotsfield in the summer of 2006 and on 26 August scored the first goal of his career when a sliced free-kick from his own area managed to outfox the Rugby Town goalkeeper. In June 2007, he departed the club by mutual consent after being told he didn't figure in the plans of newly appointed manager Frank Gregan. In 2008, he joined

Southern League Premier Division The Southern League is a men's football competition featuring semi-professional clubs from the South and Midlands of England. Together with the Isthmian League and the Northern Premier League it forms levels seven and eight of the English foot ...

side

Tiverton Town Tiverton Town Football Club are an English football club based in Tiverton, Devon. The club are currently members of the and play at Ladysmead. History The club was established in 1913 as Tiverton Athletic, and initially played at the Athle ...

. Is still goalkeeping coach at Bristol Rovers and holds the level two coaching badge, UEFA C goalkeeping and UEFA B goalkeeping licence. On 10 June 2010, he agreed to join his former club

as a part-time goalkeeping coach. At this time, Steve Book was given the worst ever Fifa Ultimate Team rating at 40 on Fifa 12 and he is still the worst to date. In August 2011, at the age of 42, Book was again registered as a goalkeeper at Cheltenham for a League Cup match against

MK Dons Milton Keynes Dons Football Club (), usually abbreviated to MK Dons, is a professional association football club based in Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England. The team competes in , the third tier of the English football league system. ...

where he sat on the bench.

Career statistics

Playing honours

Cheltenham Town

FA Trophy The Football Association Challenge Trophy, commonly known as the FA Trophy, is a men's football knockout cup competition run by and named after the English Football Association and competed for primarily by semi-professional teams. The compet ...

winners: 1997–98 *

Football Conference The National League (named Vanarama National League for sponsorship reasons) is an association football league in England consisting of three divisions, the National League, National League North, and National League South. It was called the ...

runners-up: 1997–98 *

winners: 1998–99 * Third Division play-off winners: 2001–02

Tiverton Town

* Devon St. Luke's Cup Final runners-up 2008–2009

Coaching honours

Cheltenham Town

* Vanarama National League Winners: 2015–16 *

League Two The English Football League Two (often referred to as League Two for short or Sky Bet League Two for sponsorship purposes, and known as the Football League Two from 2004 until 2016) is the third and lowest division of the English Football Lea ...

Champions:

2020–21 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Book, Steve 1969 births Living people Footballers from Bournemouth English men's footballers England men's semi-pro international footballers Men's association football goalkeepers Welton Rovers F.C. players Paulton Rovers F.C. players Frome Town F.C. players Weston-super-Mare A.F.C. players Bath City F.C. players Brighton & Hove Albion F.C. players Slough Town F.C. players Lincoln City F.C. players Forest Green Rovers F.C. players Cheltenham Town F.C. players Swindon Town F.C. players Cirencester Town F.C. players Gloucester City A.F.C. players Bristol Rovers F.C. players Mangotsfield United F.C. players Tiverton Town F.C. players English Football League players National League (English football) players Cheltenham Town F.C. non-playing staff