Plot summary

Seeing the general adulation paid to the players even off the field, Yorkshire coal miner Frank Machin, through a series of actions, is able to secure an official tryout with his town's league rugby team. While his rough and largely ungentlemanly conduct on the field garners mixed reactions from those who will make the decision on whether he makes the team, he not only ends up making the team, but is able to negotiate a lucrative signing bonus, the money which he tries to use to make himself happy. His play generally does make him a fan favorite and a media darling in epitomizing pure masculinity. However, he is unable to impress the one person he really wants to impress, namely widowed working class Margaret Hammond. In having rented a room in her house for the past few months, Frank lives with Margaret and her two adolescent children, Lynda and Ian. She has shut down emotionally ever since her husband Eric died in an industrial accident, she still needing that connection to him in keeping and polishing his work boots which she keeps hidden in a cupboard. She is unaware of the rumor, probably which is reality and which Frank has heard, concerning Eric's death, it placing their strained relationship into context.—Huggo