Talented sportsmen inexplicably go absent without leave, crafty gamblers conspire in the hope of making a killing, and personal rivalries and jealousies come to a head on fields of play... The links between sport and fictional crime were celebrated in Ellery Queen's anthology Sporting Blood (1942), although that book also included such activities as poker, chess, and the collecting of coins and butterflies. This collection is the first major attempt in the UK to gather together short mysteries with a sporting theme.

Each story features a different sport and each is written by a different author. The sports covered include golf, cricket, soccer, rugby, running, swimming, boxing, archery, rowing, tennis and squash. The classic stories in this new British Library anthology show that crime is a game for all seasons.