Join international rugby referee Wayne Barnes as he lifts the lid on a lifetime of trying to keep the biggest names in the sport on best behaviour.

There aren’t many people who can say they’ve been the thirty-first man on the pitch during a World Cup humdinger; listened to the sobs of a 20-stone prop as he tries to belt out his national anthem or been yards away from the greatest players of the last twenty years. So just how did a working-class lad from the Forest of Dean find himself doing just that?

Candid, humble and warmly told, Throwing the Book is a definitive account of what it means to be a rugby referee and a love letter to the sport that has provided Wayne with so much.