A Strange Kind Of Glory: Sir Matt Busby And Manchester United


Eamon Dunphy - 1991
    He is regarded by many as the greatest manager ever, building three brilliant sides with players such as Charlton, Edwards, Law & Best. Originally written just two years before Busby's death, this book is now available with a new introduction.

The Red Machine: Liverpool in the '80s: The Players' Stories


Simon Hughes - 2013
    The resulting interviews, set against the historical backdrop of both the club and the city, provide a vivid portrait of life at Liverpool during an era when the club's unparalleled on-pitch success often went hand in hand with a boozy social scene fraught with rows, fights, and wind-ups. Former Liverpool players John Barnes, Bruce Grobbelaar, Howard Gayle, Michael Robinson, John Wark, Kevin Sheedy, Nigel Spackman, Steve Staunton, David Hodgson, and Craig Johnston, as well as first-team coach Ronnie Moran, all candidly recollect their memories of this exciting time in Liverpool Football Club's history.

The Deal: Inside the World of a Super-Agent


Jon Smith - 2016
    . . an in-depth excavation of the murky and mysterious world of football business. Smith's candid and often shocking book reveals the true workings of football business that take into account things few of us even could even imagine . . . The Deal answers some of those questions and leaves you wanting more. It is an educational tool that most fans could do with researching' Joe Short, ExpressFootball analysis has grown at the same exponential rate as the sport's popularity and yet one of its most intrinsic elements remains tantalisingly opaque: the role of 'agent'. The Deal is a unique and fascinating perspective into the business of sports management through the eyes of 'Mr Football', 'super-agent', Jon Smith. 800,000 watch their professional football team play each week and TV pulls in audiences of around 600 million. Despite these phenomenal figures, the complex money-making scene behind sport is one of its biggest mysteries. The Deal will be an unprecedented insight into this world, showing what goes on as players and big money change hands. The Deal is also the story of one of the shrewdest and most successful businessmen of our time. Documented through Jon's personal rollercoaster of high-flying success to near bankruptcy, the book's over-arching narrative will offer an inspiring personal journey as well as insider knowledge of brokering deals at a high level and under extreme pressure. The Deal will appeal strongly to buyers of business books as well as a significant number of sports fans interested to know what goes on in the back room of their favourite sport.

Tuffers' Cricket Tales


Phil Tufnell - 1994
    Phil Tufnell, aka 'Tuffers', is the much-loved English cricketer from the 1990s who has now become one of this country's favourite broadcasters. Not cast from the same mould as other players of his generation, Tufnell became a cult figure for his unorthodox approach to the game ... and to life in general. 'Tuffers' Cricket Tales' is a collection of the great man's favourite cricket stories that will amuse and inform in equal measure. Tufnell's unmistakably distinctive voice, as heard to such good effect on 'Test Match Special', steers fans through dozens and dozens of terrifically entertaining and insightful anecdotes, garnered from his 25-year playing and broadcasting career. He introduces a cast of genuinely colourful characters found in dressing-rooms and commentary boxes from around the world, and in the process offers a uniquely warm and quirky homage to his sport. A perfect Father's Day gift for all cricket fans.

Winner: My Racing Life


A.P. McCoy - 2015
    This is it. This is really the end. I was now a matter of seconds away from the moment all the numbers stopped for ever. My career total of National Hunt winners would remain at 4,348 after this, my 17,546th ride. All the stats, the numbers that had governed my life for the last two decades, they were just a few hundred yards from being stilled for ever. My whole career, my whole adult life, had been built on making those numbers click upwards as fast as I could, but in a couple of furlongs they would never move again.Deciding to retire was the most difficult decision I've ever had to make. Fortunately I was able to go out at the very top, and being able to say that makes me a very, very lucky man indeed. And now, in this book, I've been able to look back over my entire career - both good and bad moments - and see it in its entirety: the biggest wins, the disappointments, the injuries and the tragedies, my wonderful family, and the amazing horses and the fantastic personalities I've worked with.18,000 people turned up to that final race at Sandown, and I can now look back on my career with immense pride and gratitude. But that chapter of my life is closed. This book is the final word on my riding career - it's time to move forward.

Pep's City: The Making of a Superteam


Lu Martin - 2019
     Throughout that journey, the Spanish journalists Lu Martín and Pol Ballús have been embedded with the club, reporting this inside account of how a phenomenal team was constructed: from the recruitment of Guardiola himself, to the backroom staff that provide the platform for his team and the superstar players that have set a new standard in British football. No other sportswriter has had this kind of access to Guardiola and his team during their three seasons in Manchester. The result is exclusive, in-depth interviews and profiles of every key figure at City, and the inside stories on the decisions that have shaped the team, including the defensive transformation that saw Guardiola change his goalkeeper and full-backs ahead of his record-breaking 100-point season of 2017-18; the dinner date with Sergio Agüero that changed the course of the City striker's career; and close-ups on every big game in the thrilling finale to the 2018-19 title race.

Vertigo: One Football Fan's Fear of Success


John Crace - 2011
    John Crace and Spurs were made for each other. But then the team started to play like possible champions. For most fans, these are the glory moments they dream about. For Crace they just opened a new dimension of anxiety: the fear of success. Crace has supported Spurs for 40 years. His wife thinks he suffers from a psychiatric disorder, but fandom is not only one of the ways he negotiates his relationships, it also helps him make some sense of his life. Vertigo is the story of why fandom that starts out in boyish hope always ends in dark comedy.

Icons: My Inspiration. My Motivation. My Obsession.


Bradley Wiggins - 2018
    Among them is Sir Bradley Wiggins – a man uniquely placed to reflect on the history of this remarkable sport and its unforgettable titans.In Icons, Wiggins takes the reader on an extraordinarily intimate journey through the sport, presenting key pieces from his never-before-seen collection of memorabilia. Over the course of his illustrious career, he amassed hundreds of items – often gifts from its greatest and most controversial figures. Each reflects an icon, a race or a moment that fundamentally influenced Wiggins on both a personal and professional level.By exploring the lives and achievements of 21 of the sport’s key figures – among them Fausto Coppi, Jacques Anquetil, Miguel Induráin and Tom Simpson – Wiggins sheds new light on what professional cycling demands of its best competitors. Icons lauds their triumphs, elucidates their demons and sheds light on the philosophy and psychology that comprise the unique mindset of a cycling champion.

This Is The One: Sir Alex Ferguson - The Uncut Story Of A Football Genius


Daniel Taylor - 2007
    A year earlier his managerial career had reached its nadir amid speculation he would be forced out of Old Trafford. He was taken to the limit over the Roy Keane scandal, his volatile relationship with the media, the political fallout of Malcolm Glazer's takeover and a miserable six-month run in which the team were humbled in Europe, embarrassed by the Conference side Burton Albion and barracked by their own fans. Ferguson, it is claimed, came close to quitting. But the great man has used his inimitable managing skills and bloody-minded determination to turn it around yet again and remind everyone he is still the most formidable manager in the business.Written over the course of two hugely eventful, diverse and controversial seasons, "This Is The One" offers a unique, warts-and-all portrait of Ferguson from a privileged behind-the-scenes position. As a football writer for the Guardian, Daniel Taylor has been there from day one and seen every side of Ferguson, from the flint-faced authoritarian to the kind, quick-witted man with the heart the size of the Old Trafford trophy room. Entertaining, revelatory, sometimes shocking but always affectionate, this is the close-up look at one of the most talked-about figures in sport, in good times and bad, and culminating in the glory of his ninth tittle win.

The Game Plan: The Art of Building a Winning Football Team


Bill Polian - 2014
    After building the Buffalo Bills team that went to four consecutive Super Bowls and taking the expansion Carolina Panthers to the NFC Championship just two years after the team’s creation, he was responsible for the Indianapolis Colts drafting Peyton Manning with the first overall pick in 1998 and oversaw the team’s victory in Super Bowl XLI. Now, Polian shares his blueprint for building a successful football team in The Game Plan. He details the decisions both a team needs to make in the regular season and the offseason to bring teams to the postseason and the NFL’s ultimate test of a well-built team: the Super Bowl.

Shot and a Ghost: a year in the brutal world of professional squash


James Willstrop - 2012
    

Kaiser: The Greatest Footballer Never To Play Football


Rob Smyth - 2018
    He’s the most loveable of rogues with the most common of dreams: to become a professional footballer. And he isn’t about to let trivial details like talent and achievement stand in his way. . . not when he has so many other ways to get what he wants.In one of the most remarkable football stories ever told, Kaiser graduates from abandoned slumdog to star striker, dressing-room fixer, superstar party host and inexhaustible lover. And all without kicking a ball. He’s not just the king… he’s the Kaiser.

On the Clock: The Story of the NFL Draft


Barry Wilner - 2015
    No passing, running, tackling, or kicking. Hey, there isn't even a field. Yet the draft has become more popular than many other sporting events, including the National Basketball Association (NBA) and National Hockey League (NHL) playoff games, against which it goes head-to-head for viewers. In fact, the draft has spawned its own cottage industry in which names such as Gil Brandt, Mel Kiper, Jr., and Mike Mayock become as well-known as any of the first-round selections.In On the Clock, Ken Rappoport and Barry Wilner chronicle the history of the proceedings. The veteran sports writers take you from the first grab bag in 1936, when Philadelphia chose Heisman Trophy winner Jay Berwanger of the University of Chicago and saw him decline to play in the NFL, to the 2014 draft—considered one of the deepest in talent ever.Along the 78-year journey, learn about the competitions for the top overall spot (Peyton Manning vs. Ryan Leaf), the unhappy No. 1s (John Elway and Tom Cousineau), the big flops (JaMarcus Russell) and the late-rounders-turned-superstars (Tom Brady).Meet the draft wizards, from Paul Brown to Bill Walsh and Jimmy Johnson. And the draft whiffs that cost personnel executives their jobs.On the Clock takes you behind the scenes at one of pro football’s yearly major events. Barry Wilner has been a sportswriter for the Associated Press since 1975. He has covered virtually every major sporting event, including twelve Olympics, nine World Cups, twenty-six Super Bowls, the World Series, and the Stanley Cup finals, and has written thirty-nine books. He lives in Garnerville, New York.Ken Rappoport is the author of more than sixty sports books for adults and young readers. Working for the Associated Press in New York for thirty years, he has written about every major sport. His assignments included the World Series, the NBA Finals, and, as the AP’s national hockey writer, the Stanley Cup Finals and the Olympics. He lives in Egg Harbor Township, New Jersey.

Hunger: Sean Kelly: The Autobiography


Sean Kelly - 2013
    

The Football Manager's Guide to Football Management


Iain Macintosh - 2015
    It’s for anyone who has ever tried to prove that point by taking the hot seat in the management simulation Football Manager. Whilst most Football Manager players feel they possess innate tactical awareness, on point man-management skills and a gift for dealing with the media; even the most hardened fan would have to admit there’s much to be learned from those who ply their trade in the real world. If you want to make an immediate impact on your struggling hometown club, you need to refer back to Sir Bobby Robson. If you want to lay down the law with your young players, you need to take tips from Sir Alex Ferguson. Want to avoid a financial catastrophe? Then learn from Leeds United!So if, at any point in your life, you have imagined yourself in a tracksuit, waving your arms in the air on the touchline, with your perfect XI scribbled on the back of a beer mat and thinking ahead to the press conference, then this book is for you. After all, you’re already a football manager… you just haven’t been appointed yet.