ZINE REVIEW: Alternative Wales Issue Sixteen (December 2024)

Latest issue (#16) of Alternative Wales, a zine dedicated to all things Welsh football.

Alternative Wales is a professional-looking A5 zine that covers all aspects of Welsh football, from the League of Wales, through the clubs playing in the Saes leagues, to the international side. It also covers most aspects of football culture. Or, in their own words…

Celebrating the unique culture of Welsh football from the international game to grassroots. We champion the entertaining, funny, irreverent and creative characters within our game.

Welsh football culture has its own soundtrack, its own style, its own sense of humour and Alternative Wales brings it all together in one place.

We release four magazines a year, a weekly podcast and host multiple events.

Previous issues have covered subjects such as Wales on film, Welsh anti-fascist music, Cool Cymru, walking football,  women’s football, going to Copenhagen with Llantwit Major FC, a tribute to Gareth Bale and loads of previews and reviews of Wales Away trips.

This issue is a Wales Away Special to coincide with the end of a successful Nations League campaign,  with Bellamy bringing a new optimism to Wales fans. It features several contributors reminiscing on past trips away and how they fell in love with being part of the Red Wall. Including following the women’s team.

The common thread appears to be,  surprise surprise, that whilst everyone loves football, when the balls come out of the pot for the next tournament,  everyone is hoping for an interesting country they have not been to. Worrying about whether or not we can beat the teams we draw is a close second consideration. Who amongst us would visit Armenia, Azerbaijan or China if it wasn’t to watch eleven Welshmen running around a pitch for ninety minutes?

The Nations League campaign of 2024 alone presented opportunities to go up in a hot air balloon, go whale watching and party in a beach bar. Whilst you could do these things anyway, Wales Away has the added bonus of cheering on the team, hugging strangers when a goal goes in, bumping into people you’ve never met but live two streets away, catching up with people from the other side of Wales you hooked up with five trips ago and singing Sweet Caroline on top of a table in a former KGB bar at 3am.

Contributors vary from veterans of several dozen aways, starting back in the last century to newbies who went to their first game in 2021. They all have one thing in common. They have been bitten by the bug and are hooked.

There’s an article about the night Super Fury Animals played a festival in Toulouse when Wales just happened to be playing Russia there in Euro 2016. Several people share memories of the night. Unfortunately my memory of the night was that they wouldn’t let me take my camera in. I wasn’t going to leave it with security so I headed back to the pub and missed out.

It’s all written in a lighthearted, irreverent style that can only come from writers that actually share the love of Wales Away.  If you have also been bitten by the bug you will have empathy with the contributors. If you have yet to experience that buzz, you will be Googling the FAW membership scheme.

Roll on Kazakhstan.

Get your copy of Alternative Wales, or learn about their podcasts and stuff – go to Alternative Wales