By the summer of 1996, Newcastle were officially the second best club in England following a dramatic race for the Premier League title, with the ambition to become even bigger. They would break the transfer world record by signing the England captain Alan Shearer, ahead of rivals Manchester United, for GBP15 million from Blackburn Rovers and had the talismanic figure of Kevin Keegan as their manager. It was expected a golden period to match the start of the 1900s would follow, when Newcastle had been champions of England three times and had reached five FA Cup finals. Instead, by the start of 1997, Keegan had left following a boardroom row. Sir Bobby Robson had accepted and then turned down the chance to replace Keegan as manager and Newcastle had turned to Kenny Dalglish to maintain their assault as a genuine, emerging force in European football. Dalglish himself would be sacked within 18 months and Newcastle would embark on a breathless and reckless period in their history. Tunnel of Love reflects the dramatic highs and gut wrenching lows that covered the 13 year period which followed the failed agony of falling so close to becoming champions of England in 1996, when Keegan's Entertainers were in their pomp. It takes in unforgettable nights at St James' Park - the beating of Barcelona, the apparent taming of Manchester United and the breathtaking tribute to Shearer - for 10 years' service that saw him become the club's all-time leading goalscorer. Yet by its close Newcastle are fighting for their Premier League lives as they head to Villa Park on the final day of the 2008/09 season. Tunnel of Love takes you back on the rollercoaster that got them there.

Football is undoubtedly the sport with the largest following in the world, attracting billions of fans across the globe. These fans play an integral part in determining the identity of the football club they support. Many studies have focused on the intense rivalry between clubs, their fans and the opposing identities they represent. However, little attention has been paid to examples of cooperation between rival fans. This book is the first to explore antagonistic cooperation in football; the idea that rival fans can work together despite their animosity. With examples from Argentina, Brazil, Germany, Mexico, Croatia, Poland, Turkey, Ukraine, the UK, the US and Zimbabwe, this book brings together case studies on rival fans working together and explores how and why such cooperation takes place. Showcasing original research from a team of international football scholars, it sheds new light on the social and political complexities of contemporary football fan culture. Football Fans, Rivalry and Cooperation is fascinating reading for anybody with an interest in football studies, the sociology of sport, sport and politics, or sport and social theory.

Soccer is undeniably the most popular sport in the world. While we know much about its high-profile players and their increasing wealth and global influence, we know little about referees and the ways in which refereeing has changed throughout the history of the sport. This book provides an in-depth exploration of the evolution of the match official. It presents a comparative analysis of elite Association football referees in England, Spain and Italy, as well as offering insights into the involvement of UEFA and FIFA in referee training. Drawing on archive material, the book documents the historical development of refereeing and sheds new light on the practice of elite refereeing in the present day. Including exclusive interviews with elite and ex-elite referees, as well as with professional soccer managers and members of the broadcast media, it considers the current role of match officials and the challenges and controversies they encounter. Elite Soccer Referees: Officiating in the Premier League, La Liga and Serie A is fascinating reading for all students and scholars with an interest in soccer, sport history, sport policy, sport management and the sociology of sport.

Football is ubiquitously acknowledged as 'The Global Game' and/or 'The People's Game' - everyday all-encompassing terms familiar to anyone with an interest in football which illustrate, albeit nebulously, the game's international reach and popularity. Yet much academic and popular attention has been, and continues to be, narrowly centred on topics pertaining to the elite and professional aspects of the game. At a time when there appears to be an ever-widening gap between the grassroots and elite levels of the sport, this book brings together, for the first time, a collection of research articles dedicated solely to youth and junior grassroots football. The intention is to generate future inquiry, encourage theoretical debate and stimulate empirical research on topics and issues within the relatively marginalised area of the game that is youth and junior grassroots football. The collection represents a preliminary consideration of what is already currently known about grassroots football and, no less importantly, point towards what remains unknown and under-researched but which deserves much more attention than has been given hitherto. As such, the collection includes contributions from practitioners and researchers alike. Topics included range from the provision, organisation and development of grassroots football in one national association, to broader issues such as the sources of enjoyment in participation, the lived experiences of junior players and coaches, to the causes of youth dropout from football. In addition, the significance of social stratification and various forms of social division which structure children's participation in grassroots football are discussed. These include female participation and the role of elite female role models, and issues relating to the participation of immigrant youth. The book is intended to appeal to practitioners, academics and football enthusiasts alike. This book was originally published as a special issue of Soccer & Society.

There is developing interest in the use of sporting settings as a channel to connect people to health improvement services and an emerging body of research highlights football as being associated with positive motivational and social elements that support the maintenance of a physically active lifestyle. This text provides insights into a range of issues surrounding the role of football as a vehicle for health improvement for different groups. The contributors to this volume share some of the challenges and the benefits of using professional football settings as a channel for connecting people to health improvement opportunities. These chapters will be of interest to a range of stakeholders involved in research, policy and practice who stand to benefit from building partnerships with colleagues with expertise in (I) conducting evaluation and (II) reporting evaluation and research outcomes in peer-reviewed mediums, reflecting the value of partnerships between football-led health improvement and evaluators. This book was previously published as a special issue of Soccer & Society.

This book focuses on the advent of professional football in Liverpool and, in particular, the formation of Everton and Liverpool football clubs and their development prior to World War I. This book details the factors that led to the early dominance within Liverpool of Everton FC, and addresses the complexity of the dispute within that club leading to the later formation of Liverpool FC by expelled club members. This book also highlights, via a comparative study, the different patterns of ownership and control that emerged within the two clubs between their incorporation as limited liability companies in 1892. This book was originally published as a special issue of Soccer & Society.

Football fans are passionate and devoted followers. They are also creators and dissenters, performers and producers. This volume analyses football fandom through the media that fans use to construct fandom itself. Media is the lifeblood of modern life; it is the canvas on which ideas are spread, communities are formed and identities are expressed. Today's fan has an unprecedented variety of tools in which to express their passion, commune with others, and become a fan in front of local, regional and global audiences. The football stadium has always been rife with symbolism. Colourful scarves and communal songs and chants evoke and display local pride and distinguish us from them. The Italian football stadium has a particularly rich history as a place of collective celebration, mourning, support and political dissent. Over time, Italian fans have integrated print, radio and television into their rituals of fandom while modern digital media allows fans to publicise their identities to global audiences. This volume addresses the beauty and humour as well as the fear and anger that are conveyed in the spectrum of media as fans attempt to assert themselves as material and spiritual 'owners' of the club of their affection. This book was originally published as a special issue of the journal Soccer & Society.

Football and television have been intertwined in culture for more than half a century and Brian Barwick has played a massive role in the continuing liaison between them. Watching The Match tells the story of how football on television became a national obsession. The first live football match in England was the 1938 FA Cup final, and the winning goal was a penalty in the last minute of extra time - proof if ever it was needed that football can deliver the dramatic like no other sport. The BBCs Match of the Day, the first dedicated football highlights show, was first aired in August 1964. The FA Cup Final, for years the only match shown live, suddenly became an all-day event with ITV's FA Cup Wrestling Special FA Cup Final going up against the BBC's It's An FA Cup Knock-out. The 1966 World Cup brought live international matches into the public's home for the first time and the BBC coverage of the final will forever be remembered by Kenneth Wolstenholme's legendary, "Some people are on the pitch ...they think it's all over ...here comes Hurst ...it is now!" Soon commentators, presenters and analysts such as Wolstenholme, Barry Davies, John Motson, Brian Moore, Martin Tyler, Keith Macklin, Gerald Sinstadt, Jimmy Hill, Brian Clough and Terry Venables became national figures and their sucessors, Gary Lineker, Gabby Logan, Jeff Stelling, Adrian Chiles, more so. Satellite television has moved football into a new stratosphere with almost 40 per cent of all Premier League matches shown live every season and the FA's sale of broadcast rights in 2012 for that league alone brought in GBP3 billion. Watching The Match is full of a fascinating story, personal anecdotes and interviews from in front of and behind the cameras, spanning 75 years. Written by a man who has held every important post in football television, this is a must-read book for all football fans.

Silver Linings examines an historic and unforgettable period in the history of England's national football team. In his eight years as England boss, Bobby Robson was celebrated, derided, Diego-ed, and everything in between. His team missed one European Championship, self-destructed at another, were cheated out of Mexico 86, and then, just before he left, came within two kicks of a World Cup final. On this journey he had managed the good, the bad and sometimes the ugly. But through it all he maintained his belief not only in himself and his team, but in the notion of England. Faced with an unprecedented level of media hostility, Robson's team were inconsistent and frustrating, but at their best few could match them. Alf Ramsey may have won football's greatest prize in 1966 but no other England manager could equal the sheer drama of Robson's eight years in charge. Set against the backdrop of a vicious newspaper circulation war and the rise of hooliganism, this is the story of how Robson managed to deliver the seemingly impossible: hope.

Football is unquestionably the world's most popular and influential sport. There is no corner of the globe in which the game is not played or followed. More countries are affiliated to FIFA, football's governing body, than to the United Nations. The sport has therefore become an important component of our social, cultural, political and economic life. The Routledge Handbook of Football Studies is a landmark work of reference, going further than any other book in considering the historical and contemporary significance of football around the world. Written by a team of leading sport scholars, the book covers a broad range of disciplines from history, sociology, politics and business, to philosophy, law and media studies. The central section of the book examines key themes and issues in football studies, such as the World Cup and international competition, governance and ownership, fandom and celebrity. The concluding section offers in-depth surveys of the culture and organisation of football in each of the regional confederations, from UEFA to CONCACAF. This book is fascinating reading for all serious football fans and an essential resource for students and scholars of sport studies, as well as any practitioner or policymaker working in football. .

In a world where so many books by and about footballers are little more than bland PR exercises, Full Timebreaks the mould decisively. Stripping away the facade of what we think life must be like for an international football star, Paul Kimmage reveals a different story when it comes to Irish footballer Tony Cascarino. Scarred by his childhood, haunted by indiscretion and troubled by a secret from his past, Cascarino is struggling to find answers as he speeds towards the most terrifying juncture in sport: the end. As Cascarino opens up about his fears, crippling loss of confidence and sexual indiscretion, no wonder The Timesvoted it one of the Top Ten football books of all time and Eamon Dunphy said of it: 'If it were fiction this book could win the Booker Prize.'

As the digital revolution continues apace, emergent technologies and means of communication present new challenges and opportunities for the football industry. This is the first book to bring together key contemporary debates at the intersection of football studies, leisure studies, and digital cultural studies. It presents cutting edge theoretical and empirical work based around four key themes: theorizing digital football cultures; digital football fandom; football and social media; and football (sub)cybercultures. Covering topics such as transnational digital fandom, online abuse, and gender, Digital Football Cultures argues that we are witnessing the hyperdigitalization of the world's most popular sport. This book is a valuable resource for students and researchers working in leisure studies, sports studies, football studies, and critical media studies, as well as geography, anthropology, criminology, and sociology. It is also fascinating reading for anybody working in sport, media, and culture.

The Beautiful Badge tells the fascinating story behind the UK's football club badges, from 1860s hand-embroidered symbols on home-knitted jerseys to today's multi-million pound brands. The book not only covers hammers, cannon and Liver birds but also reveals the link between Peterhead FC and Viz comic; which TV celebrity designed Aldershot Town FC's badge; and whose GBP10 doodle became the opposition's badge. Some clubs have sported ten or more different badges over the decades, ranging from their town's coat of arms to cartoon insects and initials. Promotion, moving to a new stadium or an owner with controversial views often results in a new badge. The book plots the influence of fashion, technology and fans, and investigates the tensions between clubs and supporters over changes to their beloved badge. Do you know why your club's badge looks the way it does? The Beautiful Badge is essential reading for football enthusiasts, historians, designers and anyone who enjoys putting their feet up in the boot room.

A FINANCIAL TIMES BEST SPORTS BOOK OF 2022 A football fan's dream come true - every complete UK PANINI sticker album 1978-1985 reproduced together for the very first time. 'This book delivers a thousand memories'. Mark Lawrenson 'Swapsies', 'Got, Got, Need' and 'Shinies'... This landmark illustrated book is a fantastic feast of nostalgia for any football fan of a certain age. PANINI albums were a must-have if you were a football-mad kid growing up in the late 70s and 80s, when player stickers were bought, bartered and collected in a treasured rite of passage. This book will bring back all those 'I had that one', 'I'd forgotten about him' and 'look at that haircut!' memories as well as providing in-depth details on all the players and teams of the era. Licensed by PANINI, this is a comprehensive collection of PANINI'S UK domestic football albums from 1978 to 1985 inclusive. Covering all English First Division and Scottish Premier teams, it features not only all the great teams and players of the era, but the one-season wonders and the also-rans as well. Inside the book: - Nearly 5,000 images of iconic PANINI stickers, album covers and sticker packet designs. - Hundreds of clubs including Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal, Celtic, Rangers, Manchester City, Spurs, Newcastle United, Dundee United, Nottingham Forest, Sunderland, Aston Villa, Aberdeen and West Ham United. - Photographs and pen portraits of the great players of the day, such as Bryan Robson, Glenn Hoddle, Kevin Keegan, Ossie Ardiles, Ian Rush and John Barnes, plus World Cup winners in the twilight of their careers and young stars in the making, like Peter Beardsley, Chris Waddle, Mark Hughes and Gary Lineker.

As Marcelo Bielsa's interpreter, Salim Lamrani was his right-hand man throughout his first season in charge of Leeds United. As a privileged witness to that remarkable 2018/19 campaign, Lamrani tells the inside story of how the club came within a hair's breadth of returning to the Premier League before winning promotion in the very next season to end a 16-year exile. Lamrani lays bare the secrets behind Bielsa's methods, starting with the demands he makes in an intense pre-season, through to the Argentinian tactician's unwavering loyalty to a highly effective style of play - a style based on possession, collective coverage, rapid transitions, changes of tempo and constant attack. For him, beauty is non-negotiable. Thanks to Bielsa, the players of Leeds United were the actors in an unforgettable epic, which made an indelible mark on millions of supporters. Taking us match by match through Bielsa's first year in English football, Lamrani weaves a fascinating narrative and paints an intimate portrait of a unique football genius.

A Financial Times Sports book of the Year 2018 pick Who's better: Ronaldo or Messi? Ask any football fan and they'll have an opinion. For the best part of the last decade football has seen a personal rivalry unlike any seen before. Cristiano and Leo. This is their definitive story, from children kicking a ball halfway around the world from each other to their era-defining battle to be number one. One the preening adonis, a precision physical machine who blows teams away with his pace and power. The other a shuffling genius, able to do things with a football that seem other-worldly. Their differences seem to tap into something fundamental about football and indeed life. Between them they have scored over a thousand goals, won the Ballon d'Or nine times and redefined modern football. For the past eight seasons they have shared the accolade of best footballer in the world and arguments rage over which one deserves the title of greatest player of all time. Cristiano and Leo by Spanish and South American football expert and journalist Jimmy Burns is the essential book to understand the defining players of a generation. 'Burns is incapable of writing a boring sentence.' - Irish Times

For 150 years the FA Cup has been at the heart of English sport. From Stanley Matthews to Bob Stokoe, Bert Trautmann to Arsene Wenger and Ronnie Radford to Billy the white horse - its heroes, myths and legends form the fabric of our national game. The Cup celebrates the story of the world's greatest football competition with more than 100 stunning and evocative photos. Here is an epic tale of glorious sporting heritage and extraordinary longevity. From its Victorian beginnings as a competition for teams of former public schoolboys, to the vast Edwardian crowds flocking to the Crystal Palace, to the human dramas at Wembley in the 1950s and the heyday of the 1970s. Each photo is accompanied by the stories behind the people, places and occasions, going well beyond the familiar FA Cup tales. From the early rounds through to the pomp and pageantry of the final - this book brings you the full FA Cup story.

Whilst corruption and organized crime have been widely researched, they have not yet been specifically linked to sport. Corruption, Mafia Power and Italian Soccer offers an original insight into this new research area. Adopting a psycho-social approach based mainly on Pierre Bourdieu's praxeology, the book demonstrates that corruption and the mafia presence in Italian soccer reflect the Italian socio-political and economic system itself. Supported by interviews with security agency officials, anticorruption organisations and antimafia organisations, and analysing empirical data obtained from a case study of 'Operation Dirty Soccer', this important study explains why mafia groups are involved in soccer, what the links are to political corruption and what might be done to control the problem. It also examines the mechanisms that make it possible for mafia groups and affiliates to enter the football industry and discusses how mafia groups exploit and corrupt Italian football. This is important reading for undergraduate and postgraduate students, researchers and academics working in the areas of sociology, criminology, policing, anthropology, the sociology of sport, sport deviance, sport management and organised crime. It is also a valuable resource for practitioners in the football industry.

This book examines the most prolific international women's football tournament-the FIFA Women's World Cup-through media, fandom and how mediated women's soccer can improve on a global scale. Women's soccer has exploded in terms of media exposure, television audiences and live spectatorship. This book explores those macro-level issues, while also digging into micro-level topics such as Megan Rapinoe's celebrations and political activism, VAR reviews, LGBTQ imagery, and cultural obstacles for women's football in Central-Eastern Europe and Nigeria. Using an interdisciplinary approach, scholars look at issues through the lenses of feminist theory, cultural studies, rhetorical criticism, political economy, performative sport fandom, autoethnography, and more. Thus, the book is important reading for students, researchers and media practitioners with interests in women's soccer, gender in sports media, coverage of women's sport, and sport fandom.

Soccer has long been known as 'the beautiful game'. This multi-disciplinary volume explores soccer, soccer culture, and the representation of soccer in art, film, and literature, using the critical tools of aesthetics, poetics, and rhetoric. Including international contributions from scholars of philosophy, literary and cultural studies, linguistics, art history, and the creative arts, this book begins by investigating the relationship between beauty and soccer and asks what criteria should be used to judge the sport's aesthetic value. Covering topics as diverse as humor, national identity, style, celebrity, and social media, its chapters examine the nature of fandom, the role of language, and the significance of soccer in contemporary popular culture. It also discusses what one might call the 'stylistics' of soccer, analyzing how players, fans, and commentators communicate on and off the pitch, in the press, on social media, and in wider public discourse. The Aesthetics, Poetics, and Rhetoric of Soccer makes for fascinating reading for anybody with an interest in sport, culture, literature, philosophy, linguistics, and society.

As a universal game, association football has been particularly suited to the transfer of labour forces. It does not require the use of a specific national language, a recognized diploma or acquired qualification, and the rules are standardized across the globe. Thus the international football market could be considered an ideal example of a transnational and multicultural employment sector. Role models throughout the history of professional football have not necessarily come from the town, nation, racial group or religious denomination of the majority of supporters, as is seen in the cases of Maradona in Naples, the German Bert Trautmann after the Second World War, and more recently the Frenchman Eric Cantona in Manchester, the Cameroonese Milla in France, and the Argentinian Di Stefano in Madrid. Football provides a particularly revealing lens through which to examine changes in national styles and stereotypes as they have been (and still are) reflected in the search for identities in sporting heroes.
In this book, the authors consider the movement of football labour from the late nineteenth-century to the present day within the framework of international migration as a whole. Emphasis is given to the initial role of the British in the early twentieth century and the impact of the earliest South American and Yugoslav football 'wanderers'. The position of African footballers in the postwar period and the failure of America's national league in the 1970s are also discussed, along with the international market for coaches and managers, the development of national playing styles and the immediate consequences and future implications of the Bosman ruling.

Just in time for the 2010 World Cup, Robin Goode's photographic documentation on football seeks to show the inherent purity of the beautiful game by capturing, at grassroots level, Africa's relationship with this most popular of sports. Goode has realised that the beauty and purity of the game can be found, far from the money and celebrity it sometimes brings to mind, in the children of the poorest places on earth. Muti, both a social documentary and photographic journey, highlights not only Africa's passion for football, but also the maladies that beset the continent, and football's potential role as a balm for those maladies. The Muti project aims at raising money to supply children's charities with much-needed medicine.