What's the best football book of all time.

[Lovebitesandeveryfing]

Try "The Damned Utd" by David Peace. It's a biographical novel rather than a biography but a good read nonetheless.

Wikipedia states "Depicting events in the life of English football personality Brian Clough, it is set during Clough's brief and unsuccessful 44-day spell as manager of Leeds United during 1974, with frequent flashbacks to his earlier period as manager of Derby County. Despite critical acclaim, the novel was also the subject of controversy for its perceived negative portrayal of Clough and some historical inaccuracies."

I quite enjoyed it, knowing that it was a novel and giving it that licence. I think Martin Sheen's portrayal of Clough redresses the balance, and the film needs to be seen. He gets just the right mixture of arrogance and vulnerability in the man.

That author, though! I can get through some fairly arduous, reader-unfriendly stuff if I'm determined to (i.e. if I'm getting something out of the book). But I've picked up that book Red or Dead two or three times in bookshops, and I cannot even finish one page of it. It's like having your teeth drilled — all of them, at the same time. It is difficult for me to believe that anyone actually finishes that book.

 

[Lovebitesandeveryfing]

By the way, as something more reliable on Clough, with his warts and his strengths — Provided You Don't Kiss Me by a journalist who knew him well through thick and thin, Duncan Hamilton.

 

[69FACUPfinal]

Peps City. Or Treble Triumph by Howie Hock. For obvious reasons!!

I actually enjoyed Joey Bartons autobiography too, for someone so intelligent - which amazingly for a Micky he is, he can at times imo be incredibly stupid.

Roy Keanes book was also interesting for all the wrong reasons.

Fave recent is history of City from 1965 -72 The Mercer Allison years. By gum I remember some of those games like they were last season!!

 

[BTH]

City related I thoroughly enjoyed “Blue Blood -The Mike Doyle Story” which encapsulates that great era through one of my Heroes.
Non City is the Stanley Matthews autobiography which provides a great insight into how different the game was back then.

I recall that Doyle seemed very bitter in this book - a shame as he is a bona fide City legend.

For me, The Soccer Tribe was a gem of a book. Unusually Desmond Morris took an anthropological look at the rituals of the game. https://www.waterstones.com/book/the-soccer-tribe/desmond-morris/9780789336736

 

[AliBobbyJ]

The Miracle of Castel di Sangro. By an American who spent a season living in Italy following a small village's lower-division team who somehow made it to the dizzy heights of the division below Serie A.
Eduardo Galeano Football in Sun and Shadow.
Nick Hornby (ed.) My Favourite Year. A collection of supporters' memories of their team's best season. The one on Raith Rovers, of all clubs in the world, stands out.

Also still fond of the various Big Book of Football Champions annuals I got every year at Christmas as a kid.

 

[mexico1970]

 

[TivvyBlue]

By the way, as something more reliable on Clough, with his warts and his strengths — Provided You Don't Kiss Me by a journalist who knew him well through thick and thin, Duncan Hamilton.

Second this, plus Nobody Ever Says Thank You by Jonathan Wilson

 

[philiph20]

By the way, as something more reliable on Clough, with his warts and his strengths — Provided You Don't Kiss Me by a journalist who knew him well through thick and thin, Duncan Hamilton.

Duncan Hamilton is a good all round sports writer not just a football one, highly recommend his work in it's entirety.

 

[Lovebitesandeveryfing]

Duncan Hamilton is a good all round sports writer not just a football one, highly recommend his work in it's entirety.

Interesting. Didn't know that. Has he written anything worthwhile on cricket? Genuinely good cricket writers are rare, I find. C.L.R. James wrote one of the best books ever written on cricket, and a lot of other things in passing: Beyond A Boundary.

 

[Mifred]

We were really there
David Bernstein