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Books > Sport & Leisure > Sports & outdoor recreation > Ball games > Rugby football
Fourteen years since his autobiography, Size Doesn't Matter,
English rugby's most decorated flanker, Neil Back, returns with a
tale of triumphs, heartaches and broken promises. From his
anti-hero role as 'The Hand of Back' in Leicester Tigers' European
Cup triumph over Munster, to Grand Slam glory and the 2003 World
Cup with England, Neil is never far from the story. The Death of
Rugby dissects the Lions' disastrous 2005 tour of New Zealand, the
ousting of his mentor Dean Richards from Leicester Tigers, and
Neil's three years in charge of Leeds, before being recruited by
The Rugby Football Club, and why Neil and his colleagues had to
walk away, despite an unbeaten season, and league and cup double.
Neil deals with the adjustment from professional sportsman into
family and regular working life, despite a critical illness in
2013, which has shaped his perspective on life.
A book about the life and career of the popular rugby player
Jonathan Davies, who plays centre for Wales and the Lions. He is
one of the most prominent Welsh rugby players and has won nearly 40
caps. Jonathan was chosen to play for the British Lions on their
tour of Australia in 2013.
Rugby Union Threequarter Play is a technical playing guide that
examines the demands of each of the positions in the threequarters,
and analyses the specific positional roles and responsibilities.
The book will help coaches to place the right player in the right
position.
Argentina made history at Rugby World Cup 2007 by finishing third
in the world. The South American nation finished the World Cup
ahead of traditional powers including Australia, Ireland, New
Zealand, Scotland, Wales and hosts France - all have previously
hosted matches in multiple World Cup tournaments. In finishing
third in 2007, Argentina became the only Rugby World Cup semi
finalist who has not yet hosted a Rugby World Cup.Since then rugby
has undergone significant changes to at last adjust to
professionalism. Now a part of The Rugby Championship Argentina is
a rugby nation in rapid transition and Argentina has officially
been accepted as an elite team backed by a responsible union. With
England hosting in 2015 and Japan in 2019, it will be time for a
Southern Hemisphere country to host in 2023. By 2023 Oceania would
have hosted three World Cup's, Africa one, Asia one and Europe four
and the Americas zero. Rich in tradition and packed with talent
Argentina 2023 is certain to be a roaring success.
This is the first detailed and original historical study of rugby
union at a local level in Wales. The book draws upon previously
unused sources to provide fresh insights into the origins and early
years of the game in Wales. 'This Rugby Spellbound People' explores
the origins of rugby in Cardiff, from being a fringe activity of
the middle class to being a mass-participation sport by the turn of
the 20th Century. It examines the extent and nature of the club
game, how it was organized, who played and administered it, and the
impact which rugby had on the town and its popular culture. At the
grass roots, the game was dominated by neighborhood clubs, largely
involving working-class and lower middle-class players and
administrators, rather than by institutional teams organized by
social improvers. At the highest level of competition, an emphasis
on civic pride meant that success on the field was more important
than social exclusivity. The game was played and supported,
therefore, by representatives of all classes within the town, which
led to rugby becoming the dominant sporting force in what was to
become the capital city of Wales.
A comprehensive history of the oldest surviving rugby club in
Bristol. Founded in 1872 by Masters and former pupils of Clifton
College, its roots go back to Rugby School itself. This all started
with www.cliftonrfchistory.co.uk which has now become the largest
rugby club history website in the world.
Huddersfield's importance to the game of Rugby League is
immeasurable. Prior to the formation of the Northern Union in 1895,
Huddersfield Cricket and Athletic Club had an active and
ever-honourable life of thirty years or so.Then came the glorious
era of the 1914/15 'Team of All Talents' as the Fartowners captured
'All Four Cups', the combination of unrivalled individualism
enabling the Claret and Gold to sweep all before them. Other
successes were enjoyed in the 1920s, '30s and '40s, with major
trophies collected post-war until the early 1960s, although the
club did secure divisional titles and promotions through into the
1990s. Success for a rugby club such as Huddersfield comes in many
guises, it is not only cups, nor leagues won, or international caps
gained - although these things are vitally important - it is a
reputation for sportsmanship on or off the field, despite the
trials and tribulations that come along. This book represents a
pictorial journey of a great rugby league club through to the Super
League era and Huddersfield's return to top-flight rugby league.
As player, manager, and pundit, Donal Lenihan has seen it all in
the world of rugby - and done much of it too. A victorious captain
of Munster Junior and Senior Schools, he went on to skipper the
Ireland team at the inaugural Rugby World Cup in New Zealand in
1987 and was a fixture in the second row for over a decade, winning
two Triple Crowns and three Five Nations championships. Selected
for three British & Irish Lions tours, he was famous for
skippering the unbeaten side nicknamed 'Donal's Doughnuts', before
taking charge of both Ireland and the Lions as manager. From such a
stellar position at the heart of the rugby world, Donal Lenihan has
a wealth of stories to tell from both on and off the pitch, from
raucous antics on tour to the sometimes difficult fellowship of
players in a time of Troubles. He delves deeply into Cork and
Munster culture and the influence on his career of his family. And
as a much-respected analyst, Donal is also not short on voicing his
opinion on the rights and wrongs of the modern game, and how the
transition from the amateur to the professional era has affected
the heart and soul of rugby. Full of wit, insight and emotional
sincerity, this is a rugby book for the ages by a sporting great.
In his book, Niall Breslin speaks openly about living with
depression and anxiety, and his crippling journey to finally
acknowledging 'Jeffrey' - the name he chose for it - years after he
took the decision to conceal his growing mental health issues from
the world, at age 15. Told with raw honesty, it is a story of the
demons that lay beneath outward success, and how they impacted on
his career in sports and later music, as he coped with a condition
that at times seemed hell bent on wrecking everything in its wake.
It is also the story of a road to reconciliation with brokenness -
beginning after a massive panic attack before a live TV appearance
in 2012 - leading to brighter horizons. Me and My Mate Jeffrey is
an essential book for anyone who knows what it is to feel alone,
and who doesn't know how to ask for help - or anyone who wants to
better understand that journey.
In Animated by Uncertainty, Joshua D. Rubin analyzes South African
rugby through the lens of aesthetic politics. Building on 17 months
of ethnographic research with rugby coaches, players, and
administrators, the author argues that rugby is a form of
performance and further that the qualities that define rugby shape
the political ends to which the sport can be put. In this respect,
Animated by Uncertainty demonstrates that theories of sporting
politics cannot afford to overlook the qualities of the sports
themselves, and it provides a theoretical approach to illustrate
how these qualities can be studied. The book also analyzes the ways
that apartheid and colonialism inhere in South African institutions
and practices. Drawing inspiration from the observation that South
Africans could always abandon rugby if they chose to do so, Rubin
highlights how the continuing significance of rugby as a form of
performance brings traces of South Africa's apartheid and colonial
past into the country's contemporary political moment.
Forty years ago, a South African rugby tour in the United States
became a crucial turning point for the nation's burgeoning protests
against apartheid and a test of American foreign policy. In
Flashpoint: How a Little-Known Sporting Event Fueled America's
Anti-Apartheid Movement, Derek Charles Catsam tells the fascinating
story of the Springbok's 1981 US tour and its impact on the
country's anti-apartheid struggle. The US lagged well behind the
rest of the Western world when it came to addressing the vexing
question of South Africa's racial policies, but the rugby tour
changed all that. Those who had been a part of the country's tiny
anti-apartheid struggle for decades used the visit from one of
white South Africa's most cherished institutions to mobilize
against both apartheid sport and the South African regime more
broadly. Protestors met the South African team at airports, chanted
outside their hotels, and courted arrests at matches, which ranged
from the bizarre to the laughable, with organizers going to
incredible lengths to keep their locations secret. In telling the
story of how a sport little appreciated in the United States
nonetheless became ground zero for the nation's growing
anti-apartheid movement, Flashpoint serves as a poignant reminder
that sports and politics have always been closely intertwined.
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