The History Book Club discussion

This is a thread to discuss Soccer.

Gary Imlach

Product info:
The most highly acclaimed sports book of 2005...
A beautifully written and moving account of the author’s search for the man his father was, and the life he led as a well-known footballer at a time when the men who played the game, and those who watched it, led fundamentally the same lives together in the same communities.

Review
`a book of deep truths and real beauty' -- The Times, December 13, 2010

I read this book a few years ago and found it quite fascinating.

How Soccer Explains the World: An Unlikely Theory of Globalization

by Franklin Foer

Synopsis
Religious, economic, political and ethnic divisions around the world are dramatically illuminated using the world's most popular sport as a lens and metaphor. A groundbreaking work.

Soccer is much more than a game, or even a way of life. In fact, it's a perfect window into the cross-currents of today's world, with all of its joys and sorrows. Soccer clubs don't represent geographic areas; they stand for social classes and political ideologies. And unlike baseball or tennis, soccer is freighted with the weight of ancient hatreds and history. It's a sport with real stakes -- one that is capable of ruining regimes and launching liberation movements.In this remarkably insightful, wide-ranging work of reportage, Franklin Foer takes us on a surprising tour through the world of soccer, shattering the myths of our new global age. Instead of destroying local cultures, as the left predicted, globalization has revived tribalism. Far from the triumph of capitalism that the right predicted, it has entrenched corruption. From Brazil to Bosnia, and Italy to Iran, this is an eye-opening chronicle of how a beautiful sport and its fanatical followers can highlight the fault lines of a society, whether it's terrorism, poverty, anti-Semitism, or radical Islam -- issues that now have an impact on all of us. Filled with blazing intelligence, colourful characters, wry humour, and an equal passion for soccer and humanity, "How Soccer Explains the World" is an utterly original book that makes sense of our troubled times.

That looks great Nicole.

As the club motto suggests, FC Barcelona is "more than a club", and for Catalans, their soccer club is part of their cultural identity, as it allows them to express the separateness from central government, as symbolised by their arch-rivals, Real Madrid. Burns grew up in Spain, and his concise history of the club takes the reader through 100 years of history from 1900, through the Spanish Civil War, the suffering under the Franco regime and the flowering of Catalan culture immediately afterwards, right through the golden generation of Messi, Xavi, Iniesta, etc. Even if you're not a soccer fan, you will learn plenty about politics, geography, culture and of course, Spanish history. Jimmy Burns

Paul.....don't forget the author citations....it should look like this:

by Jimmy Burns

Thanks, think I have the hang of it now.

I think you do!!!! Thanks.

The Ball is Round: A Global History of Soccer

by David Goldblatt (no photo)

Synopsis:

There may be no cultural practice more global than soccer. Rites of birth and marriage are infinitely diverse, but the rules of soccer are universal. No world religion can match its geographical scope. The single greatest simultaneous human collective experience is the World Cup final.

In this extraordinary tour de force, David Goldblatt tells the full story of soccer's rise from chaotic folk ritual to the world's most popular sport-now poised to fully establish itself in the USA. Already celebrated internationally, The Ball Is Round illuminates soccer's role in the political and social histories of modern societies, but never loses sight of the beauty, joy, and excitement of the game itself.

Soccer Against the Enemy: How the World's Most Popular Sport Starts and Fuels Revolutions and Keeps Dictators in Power

by Simon Kuper (no photo)

Synopsis:

Soccer is much more than just the most popular game in the world. It is a matter of life and death for millions around the world, an international lingua franca. Simon Kuper traveled to twenty-two countries to discover the sometimes bizarre effect soccer can have on politics and culture. At the same time he tried to discover what makes different countries play a simple game so differently. Kuper meets a remarkable variety of fans along the way, from the East Berliner persecuted by the Stasi for supporting his local team, to the Argentine general with his own views on tactics. He also illuminates the frightening intersection between soccer and politics, particularly in the wake of the attacks of 9-11, where soccer is obsessed over by the likes of Osama bin Laden. The result is one of the world's most acclaimed books on the game, and an astonishing study of soccer and its place in the world.

Inverting The Pyramid: The History of Soccer Tactics

by Jonathan Wilson (no photo)

Synopsis:

Inverting the Pyramid is a pioneering soccer book that chronicles the evolution of soccer tactics and the lives of the itinerant coaching geniuses who have spread their distinctive styles across the globe.

Through Jonathan Wilson’s brilliant historical detective work we learn how the South Americans shrugged off the British colonial order to add their own finesse to the game; how the Europeans harnessed individual technique and built it into a team structure; how the game once featured five forwards up front, while now a lone striker is not uncommon.

Inverting the Pyramid provides a definitive understanding of the tactical genius of modern-day Barcelona, for the first time showing how their style of play developed from Dutch “Total Football,” which itself was an evolution of the Scottish passing game invented by Queens Park in the 1870s and taken on by Tottenham Hotspur in the 1930s. Inverting the Pyramid has been called the “Big Daddy” (Zonal Marking) of soccer tactics books; it is essential for any coach, fan, player, or fantasy manager of the beautiful game.

An upcoming book:
Release date: November 11, 2014

The Game of Our Lives: The English Premier League and the Making of Modern Britain

by David Goldblatt (no photo)

Synopsis:

The Game of Our Lives is a masterly portrait of contemporary Britain through the lens of soccer. In the last two decades soccer in the United Kingdom has made the transition from a peripheral dying sport to the very center of British popular culture, from an economic basket-case to a booming entertainment industry that has conquered the world. What does it mean when soccer becomes so central to the private and public lives of the British people? Has it enriched this island nation or impoverished it?

From the goals, to the players, to the managers, to the money, David Goldblatt describes how the English Premier League was forged by Margaret Thatcher's Britain and an alliance of the big clubs — Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester United, Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur — the Football Association and Rupert Murdoch’s Sky TV. He identifies the real winners and losers in this extraordinary period, and explains how soccer has closely mirrored the wider political and social scene.

Goldblatt argues that no social phenomenon tracks the momentous economic, social and political changes of post-Thatcherite Britain in a more illuminating manner than soccer, and The Game of Our Lives provides the definitive social history of the EPL — most popular soccer league in the world.

Thanks Jerome

La Roja: How Soccer Conquered Spain and How Spanish Soccer Conquered the World

by Jimmy Burns (no photo)

Synopsis:

La Roja is bestselling author Jimmy Burns' tremendous opus on Spanish soccer. From its early beginnings when the first soccer on the shores of Bilbao and Buenos Aires was played by British sailors and engineers, through to the influx of South American stars, and similarly inspirational Italians, Dutchman and Scandinavians, Burns show how the engagement of foreigners with home-grown Spanish talent overcame political adversity and produced football of sublime skill and passion that intoxicates fans around the world.

The book takes us on a journey through some of the extraordinary characters, classic matches, and brutal controversies that have defined Spanish football from the early days when a few enthusiasts developed their talent kicking a ball on a piece of industrial waste ground, to the emergence of rival giants, FC Barcelona and Real Madrid- the most powerful and successful football clubs in the world- to the Franco regime (that propped up the Madrid team) and democracy (where Barca has ruled), to and a national team that, encompassing all, became the world’s champion.

Ajax, the Dutch, the War: Football in Europe During the Second World War

by Simon Kuper (no photo)

Synopsis:

When most people think about the Netherlands, images of tulips and peaceful pot smoking residents spring to mind. Bring up soccer, and most will think of Johan Cruyuff, the Dutch player thought to rival Pele in preternatural skill, and Ajax, one of the most influential soccer clubs in the world whose academy system for young athletes has been replicated around the globe (and most notably by Barcelona and the 2010 world champions, Spain).

But as international bestselling author Simon Kuper writes in Ajax, The Dutch, The War: Soccer in Europe During the Second World War, the story of soccer in Holland cannot be understood without investigating what really occurred in this country during WWII. For decades, the Dutch have enjoyed the reputation of having a “good war.” The myth is even resonant in Israel where Ajax is celebrated. The fact is, the Jews suffered shocking persecution at the hands of Dutch collaborators. Holland had the second largest Nazi movement in Europe outside Germany, and in no other country except Poland was so high a percentage of Jews deported.

Kuper challenges Holland’s historical amnesia and uses soccer—particularly the experience of Ajax, a club long supported by Amsterdam’s Jews—as a window on wartime Holland and Europe. Through interviews with Resistance fighters, survivors, wartime soccer players and more, Kuper uncovers this history that has been ignored, and also finds out why the Holocaust had a profound effect on soccer in the country.

Ajax produced Cruyuff but was also built by members of the Dutch resistance and Holocaust survivors. It became a surrogate family for many who survived the war and its method for producing unparalleled talent became the envy of clubs around the world. In this passionate, haunting and moving work of forensic reporting, Kuper tells the breathtaking story of how Dutch Jews survived the unspeakable and came to play a strong role in the rise of the most exciting and revolutionary style of soccer — “Total Football” — the world had ever seen.

Are you a soccer fan?

Yes, actually. Our whole family's from Germany originally, so it's kind of inevitable. I can't say much for the US team though, lol.

Yes, yes, a sad memory (smile)

Thanks for the adds, Jerome. Soccer is probably one of the sport that has not caught my attention.....maybe I need to watch a few games!!!

Rock 'n' Roll Soccer: The Short Life and Fast Times of the North American Soccer League

by Ian Plenderleith (no photo)

Synopsis:

The North American Soccer League - at its peak in the late 1970s - was way ahead of its time. It was football as performance, played by men with a bent for flair, hair and glamour. More than just Pele and the New York Cosmos, it lured the biggest names of the world game like Cruyff, Best, Beckenbauer and the mercurial Rodney Marsh to play football as it was meant to be played - without inhibition, to please the fans. It experimented with rules and innovations that upset purists, and liberated players from the negative tactics of the muddy, hooligan-blighted grounds of Europe. Rock 'n' Roll Soccer reveals in all its glory the colour and chaos of the world's first truly international league. How it sold itself in a continent unfamiliar with soccer, and how it crashed back down to earth like a rock star's private jet, bankrupt but laughing all the way.

Thank you for the adds Jill and Jerome

Das Reboot: How German Football Reinvented Itself and Conquered the World

by Raphael Honigstein (no photo)

Synopsis:

13 July 2014, World Cup Final, the last ten minutes of extra time: Germany forward Mario Götze, receiving a floated pass from his international teammate André Schürrle, jumps slightly to meet the ball and cushion it with his chest. Landing on his left foot, he takes a step with his right, swivels, and in one fluid motion, without the ball touching the ground, volleys it past the onrushing Argentine goalkeeper into the far corner of the net. The goal wins Germany the World Cup for the first time in almost twenty-five years. In the aftermath, Götze looks dazed, unable to comprehend what he has done.

In Das Reboot, journalist and television pundit Raphael Honigstein charts the return of German football from the international wilderness of the late 1990s to Götze’s moment of genius and asks how did this come about? How did German football transform itself from its efficient, but unappealing and defensively minded traditions to the free-flowing, attacking football that was on display in 2014? The answer takes him from California to Stuttgart, from Munich to the Maracaná, via Dortmund and Durban. Packed with exclusive interviews with the key protagonists, Honigstein’s book lifts the lid on the secrets of German football’s success.

I'll See You Out There: Arsenal, Manchester United and the Premier League's Greatest Rivalry

by Rob Smyth (no photo)

Synopsis:

The rivalry between Arsenal and Manchester United in the late 1990s and early 2000s was the greatest in English football history. It is the only time two teams have completely dominated the league for a decade. It was a mixture of the epic and the pathetic, with glorious football, hateful confrontations, and even a pizza fight.

Like all great rivalries, this was a study in contrasts: north versus south, British and Irish versus French. Both regularly tried to claim the moral high ground, often at the same time. The rivalry centered on four people: the managers, Arsène Wenger and Sir Alex Ferguson, and the hard men, Patrick Vieira and Roy Keane, who regularly came together like nitroglycerin and gunpowder.

Over time, those involved have developed the mutual respect of boxers embracing after the final bell. They played when football was a mixture of silk and steel, artistry, and aggro, and know such a feud could no longer happen because of the sanitization of the game. Their rivalry was not just the greatest of its kind in English football; it was also the last.

Thank you Jerome for the add

I am not a fan of Manchester United, but this book sounds interesting, especially since Wenger is still with the Gunners, but who knows how much longer?

Very true Betsy

Jerome, from one soccer loving, German speaking Jerome to another, I recommend:

by Joe McGinniss

I remember really enjoying this book because of the rags to riches story of promotion of a small minor league team in a small Italian town. Now that soccer has become so popular in America, I don't know if it will perhaps appear pedantic in its explanation of terms, but his description of the town and its people and spirit override this. It reminds me of the run of Leicester City from the bottom of English Division II soccer to the champions of the Premier League.

Hello second Jerome - thank you for your add.

Second Jerome (smile) - your citation is almost pitch perfect - just go back in and add the citation after the author's photo which is the author's name in linkable text.

by Joe McGinniss

Once you edit your post - we always delete our helpful assists.

Happy to have you post and this sounds like a delightful book.

Jerome wrote: "Jerome, from one soccer loving, German speaking Jerome to another, I recommend:

by [authorimag..."

Lol, thanks, Jerome, I'll give this a look.

An upcoming book:
Release date: December 4, 2018

The Club: How the English Premier League Became the Wildest, Richest, Most Disruptive Force in Sports

by Joshua Robinson (no photo)

Synopsis:

The Club is the previously untold inside story of how English soccer’s Premier League became the wildest, richest, most popular sports product on the planet.

This is a sports and business tale of how money, ambition, and 25 years of uncommon drama re-made an ancient institution into a 21st century entertainment empire. No one knew it when their experiment began, but without any particular genius or acumen, the motley cast of billionaires and hucksters behind the modern Premier League struck gold.

Pretty soon, everyone wanted to try their luck, from Russian oligarchs, to Emirati sheikhs, American tycoons, and Asian Tiger titans. Some succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. Some lost everything. But the cash they flowed into English soccer lured players, agents and managers from around the world, turning aging industrial cities and obscurely named clubs into the focus of compulsive global attention.

Today, players are sold for tens of millions, clubs are valued in the billions, and games are beamed out to nearly 200 countries, all while the league struggles to preserve its English soul.

Deeply researched and drawing on 100 exclusive interviews including the key decision-makers at every major English team — from aristocrats like Manchester United and Arsenal, to the arrivistes at Chelsea and Manchester City — The Club is the definitive and wildly entertaining narrative of how the Premier League took over the world.

Thank you Jerome

Interview and review with David Papineau in FiveBooks - David is a philosophy professor and sports enthusiast:

"Wasn’t that because, as in many sports, and in other aspects of life, people are seduced by appearances?

Some people look like sports people, but it doesn’t mean they can perform better than people who are slightly ungainly.

In soccer, we’ve had Peter Crouch who came through. He didn’t look like a footballer because he’s six foot eight and very skinny, and a lot of people were very prejudiced against him being an effective striker, but if you analyse the statistics, he’s a match-winner.

That’s part of it. Billy Beane, the central figure, was himself a great young baseball hopeful, he looked completely wonderful, and he played in Major Leagues on and off for a few years, but he never batted well enough for the level at which we was playing.

That sort of weakness does get found out, it’s like a plausible-looking striker who never scores any goals. You’d see at the end of the season, he’d only got five goals, not 20.

Billy Beane was averaging in the low 200s as a batter, and that’s not good enough. So it’s not as if people who look good but don’t perform don’t get found out: it’s more subtle. Baseball batting averages are the traditional way of assessing the worth of a batsman.

But the statisticians showed that batting averages are a terribly crude tool, and RBI (runs batted in), another statistic they use all the time, is another terribly crude tool: they don’t measure what you’re really interested in, they don’t measure how much the batters are contributing to the success of the team. If you’re no good, you’ll be found out even by these crude measures, but if you really want to work out which are the best players to spend your money on, which tactics you should be encouraging, then you need a very careful statistical analysis, and nowadays, all the baseball teams do use it.

The shocking thing is that the data and information were available for decades, and somehow they just all ‘knew better’. They knew better in their guts that the right way to play was the way they’d always played, and it makes one think that, well, baseball managers, they are a kind of in-between case: they’re baseball managers, they spend all their lives in baseball, they have all these very strong traditions and ideas, so that’s going to count against them innovating. On the other hand, they are in a very competitive environment involving lots of money, and you think that analysts would come in and tell them what to do, but they didn’t. The analogy that one immediately wants to draw, and of course it’s worrying, is politics in general.

There are politicians and people who vote for them who think that they know in their guts what’s right about immigration, drug policy, prison policy, economics in general, and they will vote and the politicians will follow them just on these gut reactions; even when there’s plenty of statistical evidence around showing that the policies everybody favours are not going to produce the effects they want.

More:
https://fivebooks.com/best-books/davi...

Moneyball

by Michael Lewis

Source: FiveBooks

Fever Pitch

by Nick Hornby

Synopsis:

In America, it is soccer. But in Great Britain, it is the real football. No pads, no prayers, no prisoners. And that's before the players even take the field.

Nick Hornby has been a football fan since the moment he was conceived. Call it predestiny. Or call it preschool.

Fever Pitch is his tribute to a lifelong obsession. Part autobiography, part comedy, part incisive analysis of insanity, Hornby's award-winning memoir captures the fever pitch of fandom — its agony and ecstasy, its community, its defining role in thousands of young mens' coming-of-age stories.

Fever Pitch is one for the home team. But above all, it is one for everyone who knows what it really means to have a losing season.

Review:

In an interview with David Papineau, a philosophy professor and sports enthusiast with Five Books:

In Fever Pitch, there’s a sense that joy and suffering, the great emotional surges, and, at least in his early life, the whole of Hornby’s life revolves around the fate of his team. It requires him to make that kind of commitment to achieve the emotional sense of being alive: he couldn’t have achieved those levels of intensity without the commitment. The so-called neutral viewer of a match who enjoys it on aesthetic grounds, and admires skill, couldn’t possibly go through the same range of emotions as him.

"Yes, but is he lucky or not in that respect? He’s an extreme case, and as he says in the book at various points, he keeps getting introduced to people as, ‘here’s a fellow Arsenal fan.’

But most of them turn out not to be real fans: they just look at the score on Sunday mornings. That’s not what he means by being a fan. It’s pretty clear from the book that the extreme commitment and dependence on Arsenal is making up for other things in his life. Hornby’s commitment to Arsenal has an emotional intensity that isn’t shared by many other more part-time fans.

Stephen Mumford, a philosopher at Nottingham, has written a book which is a plea for impartial sports appreciation. He thinks that the fan is being blinded to the pleasures, the aesthetic pleasures, the pleasures of appreciating tactics, the pleasures that are open to a non-fan, somebody who watches the game just to appreciate the finer points of the play, and doesn’t really care who wins. I’m not sure I agree.

As I said, I think life would be thinner, much thinner, life would be pretty much unrecognisable if we didn’t find ourselves siding with groups to which we have found an affinity. Sometimes we don’t choose them, our families, our schools, our countries, but sometimes we do—our fellow hobbyists, people who like Mississippi Blues, people who like certain kinds of philosophy—and we root for our team.

To feel that life would be better if we didn’t become partisan and tried to see everything from an unengaged point of view, is the wrong way to live. At the same time, we shouldn’t feel that our commitments should automatically have priority over other people’s commitments."

More:
https://fivebooks.com/best-books/davi...

Source: FiveBooks

An upcoming book:
Release date: October 28, 2025

The Power and the Glory: A New History of the World Cup

by Jonathan Wilson

Synopsis:

Since 1930, the World Cup has become a truly global obsession. It is the most watched sporting event on the planet, and 211 teams competed to make it into the 2022 tournament. From its inception, it has also been a vehicle for far more than soccer. A tool for self-mythologizing and influence-peddling, The World Cup has played a crucial role in nation-building, and continues to, as countries negotiate their positions in a globalized world.

The Power and the Glory is a comprehensive history of the matches and goals, the tales of scandal and triumph, the haggling and skulduggery of the bidding process, and the political and cultural tides behind every tournament. Jonathan Wilson details not merely what happened but why, based on fresh interviews and meticulous research. The book is as much about the legends of the sport, from Pelé to Messi, as it is about the nations that made them, from Mussolini’s Italy to partitioned Germany to controversy-ridden Qatar.

Brimming with politics, heart, and drama, on and off the pitch, The Power and the Glory is the definitive story of the greatest cultural event of our time.

Evidently, Jerome,”The Power and the Glory” is a popular title! Not only a soccer book, but Adrian Tinniswood has a new book out with the same title … of course, Graham Greene wrote a superb book with that title … and if you go back far enough, Jesus popularized it! Thank you for your usual splendid review!
Regards,
Andrea

by Graham Greene
by Adrian Tinniswood (no photo)
by Jesus

No books on the greatest manager, Sir Alex Ferguson.