Paul Lunney has been a devoted follower of Scottish football creating a vast archive of images and anecdotes. In this book he weaves a wonderful tapestry of imagery of players who have done so much for the club in its 124-year history. Celtic have won the Scottish League Championship on 43 occasions, most recently in the 2011-12 season, the Scottish Cup 35 times and the Scottish League Cup 14 times. In 1967 Celtic won an unprecedented quintuple: not only becoming the first British team to win the European Cup but also winning the Scottish League Championship, the Scottish Cup, the Scottish League Cup, and the Glasgow Cup. Celtic also reached the 1970 European Cup Final, and the 2003 UEFA Cup Final. This book encapsulates some of the glory by featuring star players down the ages.

From the thousands of matches ever played by Manchester United, stretching from their roots as Newton Heath to the present-day colossus that has racked up more league titles and FA Cups to their name than any other club, here are 50 of United's most glorious, epochal and thrilling games of all! Expertly presented in evocative historical context, and described incident-by-incident in atmospheric detail, Manchester United Greatest Games offers a terrace ticket back in time, taking in everything from the dark days of Munich to the unmatched League/FA Cup/Champions League Treble. An irresistible cast list of club legends - Tommy Taylor, Duncan Edwards and Bobby Charlton, George Best, Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes - springs to life in a thrilling selection of hard-fought derby matches, landmark European nights, and league and cup exploits. In all, a journey through the highlights of United history which is guaranteed to make any fan's heart swell with pride.

Firmly situating South African teams, players, and associations in the international framework in which they have to compete, South Africa and the Global Game: Football, Apartheid, and Beyond presents an interdisciplinary analysis of how and why South Africa underwent a remarkable transformation from a pariah in world sport to the first African host of a World Cup in 2010. Written by an eminent team of scholars, this special issue and book aims to examine the importance of football in South African society, revealing how the black oppression transformed a colonial game into a force for political, cultural and social liberation. It explores how the hosting of the 2010 World Cup aims to enhance the prestige of the post-apartheid nation, to generate economic growth and stimulate Pan-African pride. Among the themes dealt with are race and racism, class and gender dynamics, social identities, mass media and culture, and globalization. This collection of original and insightful essays will appeal to specialists in African Studies, Cultural Studies, and Sport Studies, as well as to non-specialist readers seeking to inform themselves ahead of the 2010 World Cup.

This book was published as a special issue of Soccer and Society.

Blackpool FC Miscellany collects together all the vital information you never knew you needed to know about the Seasiders. In these pages you will find irresistible anecdotes and the most mindblowing stats and facts. Heard the one about the goalie who sported glasses and a blue-and-white bandana? How about the fans in masks and fancy dress, known as the Atomic Boys? Or the first ever live televised League match, watched by 2.3 million viewers? Do you know which Premier League-era favourite was sent off on his debut? Which 1970s disco divas sung the official club song? Or who became the first player to play for Blackpool in all four divisions? All these stories and hundreds more appear in a brilliantly researched collection of trivia - essential for any Seasiders fan who holds the riches of the club's history close to their heart.

Coventry City Miscellany collects together all the vital information you never knew you needed to know about the Sky Blues. In these pages you will find irresistible anecdotes and the most mindblowing stats and facts. Heard the one about the substitute who scored on his debut after just 26 seconds? How about the FA Youth Cup winners who were signed by Kenny Dalglish? Or the media pundit who scored in six successive top-flight matches? Do you know what Des Bremner and Gilles de Bilde have in common with Steve Ogrizovic? Which was the last side to win a League game at Highfield Road? And who was the only Irishman who didn't know where Dublin was? All these stories and hundreds more appear in a brilliantly researched collection of trivia - essential for any Coventry City fan who holds the riches of the club's history close to their heart.

Australian women's football rides high on the sporting landscape now, but this book shows that success has been one-hundred years in the making. It shares stories of triumph in the face of overwhelming odds, and tales of heartbreak and obstacles that seem insurmountable. But it is also about community, endurance and collective success. Eye-opening and celebratory, it tells the story of amateur women kicking a ball around a century ago to Australia's national team being one of the best in the world. The Matildas are forty years old and no longer have to wear hand-me-down men's kits, pay for their own medical insurance and do it all for love not money. But there have been no free kicks along the way as they have faced prejudice and even outright hostility. Never Say Die takes in dusty archives, rainy pitch-side evenings and heart-breaking and heart-warming interviews - including with FIFA and FFA board members, Matildas past and present, W-League coaches and players, state and club administrators. But at its heart are fans from every level of the game who could not love it more. Written by two football fanatics, with access to key figures in Australian women's football, the book shows that the overnight success of Australian women's football has been one hundred years in the making.

'Football looked at in a very different way' Pat Nevin, former Chelsea and Everton star and football media analyst Football - the most mathematical of sports. From shot statistics and league tables to the geometry of passing and managerial strategy, the modern game is filled with numbers, patterns and shapes. How do we make sense of them? The answer lies in the mathematical models applied in biology, physics and economics. Soccermatics brings football and mathematics together in a mind-bending synthesis, using numbers to help reveal the inner workings of the beautiful game. This new and expanded edition analyses the current big-name players and teams using mathematics, and meets the professionals working inside football who use numbers and statistics to boost performance. Welcome to the world of mathematical modelling, expressed brilliantly by David Sumpter through the prism of football. No matter who you follow - from your local non-league side to the big boys of the Premiership, La Liga, the Bundesliga, Serie A or the MLS - you'll be amazed at what mathematics has to teach us about the world's favourite sport.

The ten most momentous days in the history of Scottish football, by ten of Scotland's best historians and journalists. several of whom are award winners.

This book applies research findings from soccer match analysis, coaching analysis, decision making in sport and motor skill acquisition to inform the coach on best practices, with a view to improving performance of the individual player and the team. Soccer match analysis has become more and more important in recent years. No professional soccer club plays a single match without having analyzed their own and their opponents matches to find the best possible plan for success. In Soccer Analytics Ian M. Franks and Mike Hughes explore soccer match analyses and use the results to develop realistic, progressive practices to improve the performance of the individual players and the team. Research is directly applied to the coaching process and technical and tactical practices are designed to accommodate these findings. Not only is the players behavior during practice and matches analyzed but the coaches as well. This helps evaluate different coaching practices to find your ideal coaching style. Coaches of soccer from elite levels to recreational players, directors of coaching clubs and teams, undergraduate university students, college professors involved in coaching and teaching soccer, physical education teachers, parents of soccer players will develop insight from the ample material presented.

Mid-Atlantic, 10 April 1954: The Queen Elizabeth's crew commit to the deep a coffin containing the remains of Liverpool Football Club, relegated that day to the Second Division. Istanbul, 25 May 2005: Liverpool's heroes hold aloft the Champions League trophy, after the greatest final ever. Between those pivotal dates, the Reds touched glittering heights and plumbed the darkest depths. But what about the fans who followed the club every step along the turbulent way? On this journey of a lifetime, Neil Dunkin relies on the cast of characters including Shankly, Paisley, Dalglish, Benitez, Pele and even Ursula Andress...and the action swings from Liverpool to Rome, Paris, Rio de Janeiro, the High Andes, even the top of one of Istanbul's tallest minarets. Subject high acclaim, this title was shortlisted in the Best New Writer category at the 2009 British Sports Book Awards.

Not German, I'm Scouse is the hilarious, emotional and compelling life story of German Liverpool supporter Carsten Nippert. As a young boy, Carsten was fascinated by the Reds. His teenage years were marked by despair and frustration as rare TV highlights and an unreliable radio reception offered the only access to his beloved Liverpool. Fear characterised his first visits to Anfield when he encountered vitriolic Mancunians and Kopites whose dialect confused him. His whole life revolved around his unquenchable passion. An emotionally blackmailed mother had to provide a ticket for a European Cup final when her underage son announced he would travel there regardless. She was even tasked, through his will, with scattering his ashes around Anfield if she outlived him. Carsten's adventures took him to Istanbul, outwitting riot police and 'bunking in' in Athens, a sleepless round-trip to Kiev and an unforgettable party in Madrid. Not German, I'm Scouse is the remarkable tale of an unlikely Liverpool fan who became a Scouser at heart.

From is genesis as Newton Heath LYR Football Club founded in 1878 all the way to the global sporting and commercial superpower that it is today, this is the history of Manchester United Football Club as you have never seen it before. Lifelong Red Devils' fan Neville Moir has distilled this extraordinary history into an amusing, fascinating and easy to read anthology. This entertaining volume is an instructive, if sometimes irreverent - but always affectionate - guide to some of the groundbreaking firsts, controversies, innovations, characters, achievements and disasters that have shaped one the greatest sporting institutions on the planet. Whether an expert or a novice, this compendium is perfect for all Man United fans, young and old, around the world.

Eye of the Tiger is the story of one of the most legendary figures in Glasgow Rangers' rich history, a man who epitomised what it meant to be a Ranger. Jock Shaw was a no-nonsense full-back whose fierce, uncompromising tackling earned him the nickname 'Tiger' from club supporters. He joined the Gers from Airdrie in 1938 for GBP2,000 and was a key figure in the Ibrox defence in the immediate post-war years. That defence was dubbed the 'Iron Curtain' because it seemed as unyielding as the barrier that divided Europe at the time. The book charts Jock's extraordinary journey from the coal pit at Bedlay (Annathill) to becoming Rangers' first treble-winning captain. His signing for Rangers started a remarkable association with the club, which lasted over 40 years and saw him serve as team captain, third-team coach and groundsman. He also captained Scotland and shared the distinction of beating England with his brother David. Ian Stewart worked with Tiger Shaw's family to bring you the inside track on his life and career.

'The whistle blows and I set off for the one kick I know will stay with me for the rest of my life, maybe even define my life...' Michael Carrick was the heartbeat of Manchester United. For more than a decade he was the player that made them tick. Loved by his managers, lauded by his fellow professionals, worshipped by the Old Trafford faithful, yet regularly misunderstood by the wider public, Carrick was a player like no other. Intelligent, calm, thoughtful - in many ways the opposite of the archetypal English midfielder - Carrick has always been his own man and is typically forthright. In his book he reveals what it's really like to win relentlessly under legendary manager Sir Alex Ferguson, shows us the hidden secrets of the famous Carrington training ground, invites us to experience the camaraderie and clashes inside the United dressing room, and lets us feels what it's like to walk out on the Old Trafford pitch alongside some of the biggest names in the game - from Ronaldo to Scholes to Giggs, Rooney and the rest. A deeply personal book, Between the Lines reveals for the first time Michael's battles with mental health, his struggles with the national side, as well as the redemption he has found with his family and his team. From growing up in the north-east to winning the Champions League and five Premier League titles with Manchester United, via West Ham and Tottenham, Carrick's story reveals him to be his own man: fearless, thoughtful, intelligent and honest. *All of Michael Carrick's proceeds from the sale of the book will be donated to the Michael Carrick Foundation, dedicated to providing financial support to community services that will give underprivileged children living in the North and North East better opportunities so that they feel safe, valued and inspired.*

‘The game isn’t what it seems from the outside. The game isn’t quite what I was expecting. The game doesn’t always work like the people on television think it does. The game is better, worse and stranger than you can imagine, and that is coming from someone who saw it all with their own eyes.’ Ever wondered what really goes on inside a Premier League dressing room, what it’s like to train under Roy Hodgson, Roberto Mancini and Fabio Capello – and what happens when you kick a sandwich at one of them? When it comes to football, former Manchester City and England star Micah Richards has seen it all – and laughed about most of it. In The Game, Micah shares his funniest and frankest stories from on and off the pitch, be it arriving at his first England training session with two left boots, attempting to supervise the infamous Mario Balotelli or winding up Roy Keane on Super Sunday. From how he spent his first Premier League paycheque and how he prepared – financially and mentally – for the day they stopped coming, to the euphoria of lifting the Premier League trophy and the physical and emotional impact of injury, Micah reflects openly on the many wins and losses in professional football. Full of Micah’s signature cheeky wit, this intimate, unmissable memoir goes behind the scenes of the beautiful game and a remarkable life and career.

Sheffield Wednesday Miscellany collects together all the vital information you never knew you needed to know about the Owls. In these pages you will find irresistible anecdotes and the most mindblowing stats and facts. Heard the one about the former player who was wrongly presumed dead for 95 years? How about the time the lads were drawn away from home in the Cup on ten consecutive occasions? Or the ex-Owl whose playing career wound up in Greenland and the Falkland Islands? Do you know which Wednesday winger drove to matches in an ice-cream van? The result of the 'secret' match played under the new Hillsborough floodlights? Or the depth of the floodwater on the pitch in 2007? All these stories and hundreds more appear in a brilliantly researched collection of trivia - essential for any Wednesday fan who holds the riches of the club's history close to their heart.

Derby County On This Day revisits all the most magical and memorable moments from the club's rollercoaster past, mixing in a maelstrom of quirky anecdotes and legendary characters to produce an irresistibly dippable Rams diary - with an entry for every day of the year. From the club's formation in 1884 through to the Premier League era, the black-and-white faithful have witnessed Football League and Cup triumphs, hard-fought derby matches, European adventures and heartbreak - all featured here. Timeless greats such as Dave Mackay, Jackie Stamps and Steve Bloomer, Kevin Hector, Stefanio Eranio and Charlie George all loom larger than life. Revisit 29 March 1975, when Roger Davies scored all five against Luton (and had two disallowed). 1 June 1967: the arrival of young boss Brian Clough from Hartlepools United. And 28 April 1996: when a Robin Van der Laan goal pipped visitors Palace to automatic promotion to the Premier League.

A Financial Times Sports Books of the Year 2018

Cristiano and Leo is the fascinating account of the lives and rivalry between two of the best footballers to ever play the game, Ronaldo and Messi by Jimmy Burns, the bestselling author of Maradona: The Hand of God.

The rivalry between Ronaldo and Messi has defined football to a generation of fans – everyone has an opinion on who is the greatest.

Do you prefer Ronaldo whose work ethic and physique have been honed for one purpose – scoring goals. Or Messi, whose superhuman natural talent means he can do the seemingly impossible with a football.

Between them they have scored over 1300 goals, won the Ballon d’Or ten times, and taken the beautiful game to even greater heights. But statistics alone cannot do justice to their skill, athleticism and dedication to stay at the top for so long of one of the most competitive sports in the world.

Cristiano and Leo tells their definitive story, from children kicking a ball halfway around the world from each other to facing each other in the epic clash El Clásico, between Real Madrid and Barcelona. This is the essential book to understand one the most compelling rivalries in sporting history.

A Director's Tale is the story of Burnley Football Club in the early 1980s, a time of short-lived success and then turmoil. With special access to the diaries of director Derek Gill, Dave Thomas brings you the unvarnished inside story, revealing what went on behind the scenes amid conflict with chairman John Jackson and manager John Bond. These were torrid times involving, at first, a surprise promotion, then a relegation, then John Bond's departure and another relegation. This was a group of men who were all competent and professional in their own fields - Jackson was a barrister, Gill an accountant - but they became a toxic mix in the boardroom. The Bond season has gone into the Turf Moor history books as one of the most damaging. His name is much derided in Burnley today, but he was only a part of a bigger problem. The Gill diaries provide a unique opportunity to see - warts and all - the workings and machinations of boardroom politics. This is a story of failure and acrimony.

In Entre Nous Grant Farred examines the careers of international football stars Lionel Messi and Luis Suarez, along with his own experience playing for an amateur township team in apartheid South Africa, to theorize the relationship between sports and the intertwined experiences of relation, separation, and belonging. Drawing on Jean-Luc Nancy's concept of relation and Heideggerian ontology, Farred outlines how various relationships-the significantly different relationships Messi has with his club team FC Barcelona and the Argentine national team; Farred's shifting modes of relation as he moved between his South African team and his Princeton graduate student team; and Suarez's deep bond with Uruguay's national team coach Oscar Tabarez-demonstrate the ways the politics of relation both exist within and transcend sports. Farred demonstrates that approaching sports philosophically offers particularly insightful means of understanding the nature of being in the world, thereby opening new paths for exploring how the self is constituted in its relation to the other.

Wolves On This Day revisits all the most magical and memorable moments from the club's rollercoaster past, mixing in a maelstrom of quirky anecdotes and legendary characters to produce an irresistibly dippable gold-and-black diary - with an entry for every day of the year. From founder members of the Football League through to the Premier League era, the Wolves faithful have witnessed title triumphs in every division from One to Four, promotions and relegations, breathtaking Cup runs and European nights - all featured here. Timeless greats such as John Richards, Mike Bailey and Steve Bull, Billy Wright, Andy Thompson and Ron Flowers all loom larger than life. Revisit 25th March 1893, when Wolves won the FA Cup before an overflowing crowd in Manchester. 17th May 1972: the UEFA Cup final decider against Spurs! Or 13th December 1954, when Wolves came back to beat Honved, helping to restore national pride into the bargain!

'Epic... Wilson writes captivatingly with humour...anyone with an interest in eastern European sport will be consulting this book for years to come' FINANCIAL TIMES 'This fascinating and perceptive travelogue includes a fine collection of anecdotes too colourful for fiction' SUNDAY TIMES 'A blissful book, lovingly and stylishly written' DAILY TELEGRAPH From the war-ravaged streets of Sarajevo, where turning up for training involved dodging snipers' bullets, to the crumbling splendour of Budapest's Bozsik Stadium, where the likes of Puskas and Kocsis masterminded the fall of England, the landscape of Eastern Europe has changed immeasurably since the fall of communism. Jonathan Wilson has travelled extensively behind the old Iron Curtain, viewing life beyond the fall of the Berlin Wall through the lens of football. Where once the state-controlled teams of the Eastern bloc passed their way with crisp efficiency - a sort of communist version of total football - to considerable success on the European and international stages, today the beautiful game in the East has been opened up to the free market, and throughout the region a sense of chaos pervades. The threat of totalitarian interference no longer remains; but in its place mafia control is generally accompanied with a crippling lack of funds. In BEHIND THE CURTAIN Jonathan Wilson goes in search of the spirit of Hungary's 'Golden Squad' of the early fifties, charts the disintegration of the footballing superpower that was the former Yugoslavia, follows a sorry tale of corruption, mismanagement and Armenian cognac through the Caucasuses, reopens the case of Russia's greatest footballer, Eduard Streltsov, and talks to Jan Tomaszewski about an autumn night at Wembley in 1973...

Aberdeen FC Miscellany collects together all the vital information you never knew you needed to know about the Dons. In these pages you will find irresistible anecdotes and the most mindblowing stats and facts. You may be rightly proud of the only Scottish club that have won two European titles and have never been relegated in their 111-year history; but did you know they also boast two players who scored six goals in a match? And did you know Pittodrie's dugouts were the first in Britain? Have you heard the one about the Dons' keeper who wore waterproofs and used an umbrella? Or how about the time Aberdeen (playing as the 'Washington Whips') were crowned champions of America? All these stories and hundreds more appear in a brilliantly researched collection of trivia - essential for any fan who holds the riches of the Reds' history close to their heart.

Norwich City On This Day revisits all the most magical and memorable moments from the Canaries' rollercoaster past, mixing in a maelstrom of quirky anecdotes and legendary characters to produce an irresistibly dippable diary - with an entry for every day of the year. From the club's formation in 1902 to the Premier League era, City fans have witnessed promotions and relegations, European adventures and Cup runs, hard times and hard-fought local derbies - all featured here. Timeless greats such as Duncan Forbes and Martin Peters, Ron Ashman, Kevin Keelan, Darren Huckerby and Mark Bowen all loom larger than life. Revisit 9th February 1980, when Justin Fashanu volleyed home the Goal of the Season against champions Liverpool. 18th March 1959: an FA Cup semi for the Third Division giantkillers of Man U and Spurs. Or 20th October 1993: City become the first and only British team to win away at Bayern Munich.

Now in paperback! Heaven Is a Playground was the first book on the uniquely American phenomenon of urban basketball. Rick Telander, a photojournalist and former high school basketball player, spent part of the summer of 1973 and all of the summer of 1974 in Brooklyn living the playground life with his subjects at Foster Park in Flatbush. He slept on the floor of a park regular’s apartment, observing, questioning, traveling, playing with, and eventually coaching a ragtag group of local teenagers whose hopes of better lives were often fanatically attached to the transcendent game itself. Telander introduces us to Fly Williams, a playground legend with incredible leaping ability and self-destructive tendencies that threatened to keep him earthbound. Another standout was Albert King, a fifteen-year-old phenom whose shy, quiet demeanor masked an otherworldly talent that eventually took him to the NBA. This edition also includes Telander’s perspectives on the arrival of an NBA team in Brooklyn. Heaven Is a Playground is one of a kind—a funny, sad, ultimately inspiring book about Americans and the roots of the sport that they love.