Rory Smith is an English journalist, broadcaster and author. He joined ''

The Athletic ''The Athletic'' is a subscription-based sports journalism department of ''The New York Times''. It provides national and local coverage in 47 North American cities as well as the United Kingdom. ''The Athletic'' also covers national stories ...

'' in 2024 having previously been the chief

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...

correspondent of ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' from 2016. Smith is a former journalist of ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...

'', ''

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 publis ...

'', and ''

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was found ...

''.

Career

Smith was

ghostwriter A ghostwriter is a person hired to write literary or journalistic works, speeches, or other texts that are credited to another person as the author. Celebrities, executives, participants in timely news stories, and political leaders often h ...

on the book ''Champions League Dreams'' with Rafa Benitez published in 2012. Smith’s 2016 book ''Mister: The Men Who Gave The World The Game'' was short listed for the

William Hill Sports Book of the Year The William Hill Sports Book of the Year is an annual British sports writing award sponsored by bookmaker William Hill. It was first presented in 1989, and was conceived by Graham Sharpe of William Hill, and John Gaustad, founder of the Sport ...

. ''Mister'' was included in the best 50 football books ever written in a list compiled by

FourFourTwo ''FourFourTwo'' is an association football magazine published by British company Future. Issued monthly, it published its 300th edition in May 2019. It takes its name from the football formation of the same name, 4–4–2. Future acquired the ...

magazine. In 2022 Smith published the book ''Expected Goals: The Story of How Data Conquered Football and Changed the Game Forever''. A frequent guest on

BBC Radio 5 Live BBC Radio 5 Live is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It broadcasts mainly news, sport, Talk show, discussion, interviews and phone-ins, and is on air 24 hours a day. It is the principal BBC radio station Broadca ...

, Smith has also written for

ESPN ESPN (an initialism of their original name, which was the Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by the Walt Disney Company (80% and operational control) and Hearst Commu ...

, ''

The Blizzard "The Blizzard" (or The Snow Storm) (, ''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 was intended to be the la ...

'' and ''FourFourTwo''. He has appeared on the ''

Second Captains Second Captains is a production company founded by Ken Early, Simon Hick, Mark Horgan, Eoin McDevitt and Ciarán Murphy and based in Dublin, Ireland. The Second Captains Podcast was launched in March 2013 and quickly became the most-popular p ...

'' podcast, often on '' The Anfield Wrap'', and ''

The Totally Football Show The Totally Football Show' presented by James Richardson is a thrice weekly podcast about association football produced by Muddy Knees Media. From June 15, 2020 it was incorporated into and also available via The Athletic. It regularly features ...

'' as well as recording his own weekly '' Set Piece Menu''

podcast A podcast is a Radio program, program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. Typically, a podcast is an Episode, episodic series of digital audio Computer file, files that users can download to a personal device or str ...

with Hugh Ferris, football commentator

Steven Wyeth Steven Wyeth is a British football commentator for the BBC and TNT Sports amongst others. Early life Wyeth attended the University of Manchester and commented on Manchester United for Manchester Sports and for BBC Radio Manchester. Career Commen ...

and former England international Andy Hinchcliffe. Television appearances include ''

Sky Sports Sky Sports is a group of British broadcasting of sports events, subscription sports channels operated by the satellite television, satellite pay television company Sky Group (a division of Comcast), and is the dominant subscription television ...

Sunday Supplement'' and

TNT Sports TNT Sports is the brand name for sports television channels, broadcast divisions, programming, and other media around the world that are owned and operated by Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD). The name originates from the American cable television ...

' coverage of UEFA club competitions.

Awards

In 2015 he was highly commended by the

Sports Journalists' Association The Sports Journalists' Association (SJA) is an association for British sports journalists. It represents the British sports media on the British Olympic Association's press advisory committee and acts as a consultant to organizers of major eve ...

He was nominated for writer of the year at the 2013, 2015, 2017 and 2019

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

Awards, winning in 2015 and 2019. ''Set Piece Menu Podcast'' was nominated in the ‘Podcast of the Year’ category at the 2018 Football Supporters Federation Awards, as well as shortlisted for the Podcast of the Year at the Football Supporters' Association awards in 2020 and 2021.

Personal life

Rory Smith is from

Leeds Leeds is a city in West Yorkshire, England. It is the largest settlement in Yorkshire and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds Metropolitan Borough, which is the second most populous district in the United Kingdom. It is built aro ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, Rory Living people Writers from Leeds Alumni of Robinson College, Cambridge English podcasters English male writers English sportswriters The Daily Telegraph people The Times journalists The Independent people The New York Times journalists Year of birth missing (living people) Association football journalists