{"product_id":"from-barnsley-to-borneo-the-alan-vest-story","title":"From Barnsley to Borneo: the Alan Vest Story","description":"\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eFrom a small Yorkshire village six miles outside Barnsley to the football grounds of Kuching, Alan Vest lived one of the most improbable journeys the game has produced.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eA prolific non-league goalscorer who swapped the round ball for the oval one at a rugby-mad grammar school, Vest built a coaching life across three countries. He captained New Zealand, became Western Australia's first Director of Coaching, took charge of Newcastle KB United in the National Soccer League, and came within a whisker of the Socceroos job, a fixture of Australian football through its formative decades.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eBut it was on the island of Borneo that he wrote his most extraordinary chapter. Handed a relegated, unfancied Sarawak side, Vest turned them into champions of Malaysia and won the lasting reverence of a state that still remembers him as the \"White Rajah\" of its football. It is a bond so deep he asked for his ashes to be scattered along the Kuching waterfront where he took his morning walks.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003eBegun by Alan himself and completed by his son Chris from a lifetime of papers, match reports and the memories of those who played for him, \u003cem\u003eFrom Barnsley to Borneo\u003c\/em\u003e is a story of ambition, discipline and adventure, and of a love for the game that carried one man far further than he ever imagined.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Chris Vest","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45426859311286,"sku":null,"price":34.99,"currency_code":"AUD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0592\/8688\/0438\/files\/FromBarnsleytoBorneov3.jpg?v=1788918838","url":"https:\/\/www.fairplaypublishing.com.au\/products\/from-barnsley-to-borneo-the-alan-vest-story","provider":"Fair Play Publishing","version":"1.0","type":"link"}