Books on Footie

What are some of your recommendations or personal favourites?

I would say How soccer explains the world by Franklin Foer. It is quite good (although my edition is titled "How football explains the world", but no touchstone on that...).

Entertaining and easy to read. A bit biased, thou' - in the chapter on jews in sports and football he in parts confuse antisemitism and a sceptisism towards how Israel handles the Palestina-issue, and in the chapter about FC Barcelona he glorifies the clubs' fans as being the only civilized fan culture describing it as open-minded and free of hate. But at least every european (he's north american) with some interest in things football knows of the rivalry between Real Madrid and Barca, and how fans openly misbehaved when Luis Figo left Barca for RM, even throwing the severed head of a pig on the pitch.

I have been contemplating buying that book for a while; it sounds good, I think I will pick it up. Thanks.

Has anyone here read Ryan Giggs’ book?

You're welcome :-)
And no, I haven't read Giggs' biography, so no help there from me... :-(

Only a Game? by Eamon Dunphy is a great football book, chronicling a middling career with Millwall FC by a journeyman footballer in the 1970s. He also worked with Roy Keane on his typically grumpy take on life with manchester and ireland: Keane: The Autobiography, well worth a read

Well, now I've actually finished How soccer explains the world, something I'll admit I hadn't done when I wrote the msg above... And I have to edit myself on the comment on how he describes Barca. He actually admits to the RM vs Barca rivalry, and even mentions the pigs' head. Still he hails the fans and the club as something unique, and for the same reasons that I wrote about above.

I quite enjoy How Soccer Explains the World and used it several times as a source for some omy university papers on football culture and globalisation. I agree that it is biased, and it's a good lead in for the reader to research more about the cultural and political situations that are mentioned.

I have to admit I've not been too interested in footballers' biographies, even though people keep giving me books like Beckham in Spain (even though it's not entirely solely about the person in the title. I haven't finished it and I've gotten it years ago.

I also enjoy Soccer in Sun and Shadow, the one with the 2002 addition (again, bought in Canada). It's stylistically informative. Poetic, even.

I would have to agree a bit with ragazzavagabonda about player biographies/autobiographies. For me it is hard to even listen to sports stars speak in interviews, but as their autobiographies tend to be ghostwritten, it makes them a bit more tolerable. I have read a bit of Beckham’s Both Feet on the Ground, and what I have read of it was pretty good.

Has anyone here read Nick Hornby’s Fever Pitch? I have owned it for a while now but have yet to read it; I have avoided seeing the US movie adaptation too, not wanting to ruin the book for me (in the movie football is replaced with baseball--which has to be the most boring sport in the world, in my opinion).

The two main problems with sportstar autobiographies is that the publisher doesn't want to upset their investment, and the player, who is usually still active in the game, doesn't wany to upset fellow players, managers, etc.

A case in point is the autobiography of Wayne Rooney, which was ghostwritten by an excellent sportswriter - Hunter Davies. Rooney is the young bright hope of English football, who despite only being 21 has still managed to run up massive gambling debts and have a perchant for visiting much much older ladies of the night. Both these
incidents are more-or-less ignored in the book.

There was a British film version of Fever Pitch which stuck to the book. It ends up being a romcom in which a man has to come to terms with the real responsibilities in his life. From what Hornby says it is based on him, and the battle between his love of Arsenal and his (now) wife.

jargoneer, I have been waiting for a long while to see the British version of Fever Pitch--I rent from an online movie service, and it’s been on the 'short wait' list for ever now! Oh well.

Busifer and ragazzavagabonda, thanks; I recently picked up How Soccer Explains the World, I have only read the first two chapters, but so far it is great. I wish more books were written like it; it’s nice to learn history and economics whilst reading about football!

Has anyone here read Bill Buford’s Among the Thugs? I got it as a gift, and have yet to read it; just wondering what others think of it.

#10 - I'm only happy to help!
/I haven't read the Buford book, so no help from me there.../

Sorry, can't help you either. I tend to avoid books, and films, about football hooliganism. It always seems to me slightly sensationalist, voyeuristic. Mind you, having experienced it first hand, perhaps I just don't to revisit it.

When they write the sequel to HSETW it will be all about economics and called, "How Money Ruined Football".

#12, paragraph 2 - Yes... I'm engaged in amateur football, coaching (an injury stopped me from being an active player...), and I've met my share of people who've watched the game for years (15-20+) but stopped as they perceive every match as rigged - even feels the whole leauges to be rigged; "this year it's club Xs' turn to win", etc.

Lucky thing there's no money involved in the leauge my team's in (other than the money we pay as fees).

I believe that matches are specifically fixed but I think the money from television (and the Champions League) has eliminated competition. Every year it is the same old teams battling domestically and in Europe because they have money. I remember Malmo battling Nottingham Forest in the final of the European Cup but that will never happen again because the authorities and the big clubs have virtually created a cartel. The players are not much better, they seem more interested in lining their pockets than developing their skills - they may deserve admiration but not respect, with a few exceptions - step forward, Henrik Larsson.

Again I agree with you, and cases like Beckham only works to confirm the theory. But I doubt ANY player could resist the smell of money...
Here in Sweden everyone is proud of Henrik Larsson and his performace in Man Utd (not to mention that he got selected at all!), but in reality he thought the long swedish winter season too boring and when a window opened he opted for the easy way out. And personally I wonder if there's not a money issue at play here? Of course it pays better to spend the winter in Manchester than in Helsingborg, close to bancrupcy as the club was not long ago.
And I bet the Barca fans wonders what he's doing...

I am glad this topic came up; it angers me quite a bit.

I think that football mirrors the world in general: corporations basically own and control most of the clubs through their sponsorships; and the clubs with the most money can basically do what they please. This is true of governments, too. Corporations ‘sponsor’ (if you will), politicians who make it easier for the corporations to do what they want.

Of course clubs need money to operate, but the current system is just appalling to me. I cringe when I see children who can name any club on the pitch simply by seeing their sponsor’s logo. And then they can tell you who their last three sponsors were. Yikes!

Thanks to these sponsorships, thousands of little kids know of Samsung and AIG, even though they have no use for their services--but theses companies know that in the future, they’ll become loyal customers because of all their fond memories as children watching their favourite clubs play. Not to mention the kids that wear their beloved club’s jerseys that are emblazoned with the likes of Carlsberg and other beer companies.

As for Becks, he states that money was not a motive, but really, how can that much money not play a role in your decision? I believe him somewhat, I know that he is fond of the States, and probably wanted the opportunity to live here, and to have his kids live here as well. But as the BBC pointed out, he will be earning 500 times what his LA teammates are earning...what message does that send?

PS I feel that I should note that I am indeed part of the problem in that I own a handful of jerseys, both football and rugby, most of which have logos garishly displayed front and centre. Nobody’s perfect, right? ;-)

There was a good article by David Conn in the Guardian a couple of weeks ago regarding agents and the ridiculous amount of money they earn for arranging transfers. If you care to read it, it can be found here.

jargoneer: I finally got to see the British version of Fever Pitch a few weeks ago; while it does become a romcom, it is much more a guy’s romcom than most movies. Overall, I liked it. Now I’ll have to get around to reading the book.

I've just bought The Thinking Fan's Guide to the World Cup by Matt Weiland. I've only had time to go through it briefly and I'm not going to get round to it for awhile now, but I was wondering if anybody else has read it, and what were their opinions about the book?

I'm reading Niall Quinn's autobiography at the moment. Excellent. He is clearly a good guy, and he (or his ghost writer, although there's none listed) can really write.

I also enjoyed El Macca: Four Years with Real Madrid by Steve McManaman (with a co-writer, not a ghost) - fascinating, life at RM before the Galacticos took over.

Futebol by Alex Bellos is a great book about the history of Brazilian football and about how the sport ties into the country's very identity. It runs a little long, but certainly gets to the heart of the sport and a nation. There are plenty of interesting stories and anecdotes to keep you entertained throughout.

Hi, my name is Pedro Cervantes

I rather enjoyed Ultra Nippon by Jonathan Birchall. It's about the beginnings of Japan's J-League.

Desultory - the Niall Quinn book was ghostwritten by Tom Humphries he's chief sportswriter for the Irish Times.

Thanks tartalom - I remember big Niall used to do a weekly column for the Grauniad - was that him, I wonder. I'd like to think it was. And if so, where - in the book - does he leave off and Tom Humphries begin?

your guess is as good as mine - Humphries has a very elegaic style. So when Big Niall goes off on a wistful tangent, Big Tom may be looking over his shoulder :)

Paul McGrath's "Back from the Brink" is really excellent, one of the most honest and frank football autobiographies I have ever come across.

Eamon Dunphy's "Strange Kind of Glory" is also really good.

I just finished Behind the Curtain: Travels in Eastern European Football and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I would rank it among the best soccer books I've read.

I've had it in my TBR pile for ages now - maybe time for it to cut the queue!

The best football book I've read was The Miracle of Castel di Sangro. The author, an American who's suddenly become messianic about the game, is often annoying but undeniably enthusiastic, and the (true) story is unbelievably dramatic. This is an absolute must for any fan of football, especially Italian football, and a great read even for non-fans. Some amazing characters, too, the dour Sicillian (I think) "mister", the scarily corrupt chairmen, the naive young players trying to scrape a career.

If you are interested in how association football developed then a book that should be on your reading list is Football, the First Hundred Years: The Untold Story of the People's Game. Brilliantly researched & explodes a lot of myths found in many 'official' histories.

Another great book about football that demonstrates beautifully the lengths people will go to to follow their team is Fever Hitch. This book tells the story of the author Adrian Bell as he hitchhikes around Britain supporting his team. Some great stories & highly amusing anecdotes about the strange situations he's found himself in & some of the even stranger people he's met.

Has anyone read Stamping Grounds Liechtenstein's quest for the World Cup by Charlie Connelly? I enjoyed his Attention All Shipping and was wondering if it was worth looking for this one.

No, unfortunately I have not, but I just wanted to say, Welcome Soda! It's good to see you here!

I have The Story of Football by Martin Tyler. The book has an Introduction by Bobby Moore. And I also have the book European Football A Fans' Handbook The Rough Guide by Peterjon Crisswell and Simon Evans.

beatles1964

Anyone who can remember Brian Clough will enjoy The Damned Utd by David Peace which covers his brief spell as manager of Leeds in the 70s.

The Fix by Declan Hill - looks at a side of soccer/football we'd rather ignore, but excellent written by top notch investigative journalist!

Another book to read is Tony Adams Addicted. It is the story of his battle against alcoholism. A great read and a lesson that the human spirit can triumph in adversity.

<33
I have read Stamping Grounds and it is a great football book. If you have enjoyed Charilie's other work you will enjoy this. It really makes you want to follow Liechenstein yourself.

There are some great football books around, but how much you like them can depend on whether you support the player or team that the book is written about. I've over 250 football books and theres a big variance in the quality I can tell you!

I will echo yarb (message 31) and say that The Miracle of Castle Di Sangro is possibly the best football book I have read. Others that i have thoroughly enjoyed are Fever Pitch which is far far more in depth than the film adaptation......its about Ar*enal and here's me a Spurs fan.... Managing My Life by Alex Ferguson is also a good read Foul! by Andrew Jennings is a good read too....and dwells on the corrupt group that is FIFA. Finally All Played Out by Pete Davies & Football against the enemy by Simon Kupar are quality reads too.

Touchstones:
The miracle of Castel di Sangro by Joe McGinniss
Fever pitch by Nick Hornby
Managing my Life by Alex Ferguson
Foul! The secret world of FIFA by Andrew Jennings
All Played Out by Pete Davies
Football against the enemy by Simon Kuper

A long time since there have been any posts here, but anyway, i thought I would mention the football books I love that haven't been mentioned:

Football Man - about the olden days (the50s and 60s) when only the club crest (and maybe the makers logo) was on the front of the players' shirts
Brillant Orange - explains to some extent why my 2nd favourite international team has never won the big one
Are you watching Liverpool - for United fans only
Left Foot Forward - a footballer's autobiography which conveys a real picture of what it is like to be an ordinary player for a lower level team - same genre as Only a game
The Glory game - I have no intersest in Spurs but like Fever Pitch, the writing and the content overcome my hopeless parochialism

If this link works, you can see my collection of football books here: http://www.librarything.com/catalog/rdurie&tag=Football

Good stuff Rob - some great titles here.

I'm gonna add My Father and Other Working-Class Football Heroes by Gary Imlach which I'm enjoying very much right now.Really opens a big window on the world of British football in the 1950s and '60s, and the era of 'retain and transfer' before the maximum wage was abolished. It seems that the main gripe of the pros in those days wasn't so much the limit on their earnings - they were just working class lads after all and didn't have too many lofty ideas - but on the ties of the bound labour they were held to by their owning clubs. If a player didn't like whatever a club offered them they really had to just lump it - or go without wages altogether. And that invariably went for transfers as well - the players had next to no say whatsoever in the matter.

Just added Simon Kuper's Ajax, the Dutch, the War: Football in Europe During the Second World War - looks like a great read.

For anyone interested, my review of My Father and Other Working-Class Football Heroes is here

I've read it twice! I blogged about it recently because it's a memoir about growing up in England as much as it is a soccer book. I love Nick Hornby's non-fiction in general anyway. I know this is an old post, but I thought I would check in and see if you've read it since the post anyway. Hope you loved it if you did!

Just finished Ajax, the Dutch, the War: The strange tale of soccer during Europe's darkest hour by Simon Kuper. This is the 2012 version published in the U.S. An excellent "sort of alternative history to WWII."

Brilliant Orange: The neurotic genius of Dutch football by David Winner was another great book.

Nice one Hagelstein! I want to read both of those for certain.

In time for this summer's football World Cup I've finished and reviewed Futebol: The Brazilian Way of Life by Alex Bellos, which was very informative and enjoyable. My review is here.

Very good review Polaris. I'll look for the book.

I received Eight World Cups by George Vecsey from the LibraryThing Early Reviewers program and just finished it. Very good personal history concentrating on World Cups from 1982 through 2010 when Vecsey was covering football for the New York Times.

Sounds good. I liked your review, and I've wishlisted this one. (Unfortunately this one wasn't available in the UK with the Early Reviewers programme.) 1982 was the first World Cup I can properly remember in detail as well.

There is a review in this week's TLS of a book by one of my favourite football writers, David Goldblatt. It's called Futebol nation. Here's the first sentence of the review:

'Like all the best books about football, this is not a book about football'.

I'll give this a try to fill in the time between matches at the WC.

Edited for dozy typing

I'm going to buy that one Affle. Thanks for the info.

I've added a few titles to my wishlist based on this thread.

There are also quite a few on the Zonal Marking site's bibliography page. I love that site, though it's still well above my head in terms of understanding the analysis. I'm using this year's Cup as a prompt to educate myself a bit more on tactics.

http://www.zonalmarking.net/bibliography/

Another book by David Goldblatt: this about the English game. Here's the review from the Guardian:

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/oct/31/game-of-our-lives-david-goldblatt-r...

My copy will come today, and I'll post some thoughts in a while.

Somewhat OT, the review is by David Kynaston, who has just published the latest part of his great social history of postwar Britain, Tales of a new Jerusalem: Modernity Britain: opening the box 1957-59. This series is brilliant history for anyone, but for those of a certain vintage, growing up in Britain in the postwar years, it's a magic carpet back to childhood.

Edited to add that the Kynaston book quoted above is the last but one, and the new one - which I'm half way through - is Modernity Britain: a shake of the dice 1959-62. Confusion is either because of the vintage referred to above, or because they both have orange dustwrappers: take your pick, and my apologies.