Joseph Delaney used to be an English teacher, before becoming the best-selling author of the Spook's series, which has been published in 30 countries and sold over 4.5 million copies worldwide. The first book, The Spook's Apprentice, was adapted into a major motion picture starring Jeff Bridges and Julianne Moore.

Joseph Delaney

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Mark Tighe

Paul Rowan

Over the course of fifteen years, John Delaney ran the Football Association of Ireland as his own personal fiefdom. He had his critics, but his power was never seriously challenged until last year, when Mark Tighe and Paul Rowan published a sequence of stories in the Sunday Times containing damaging revelations about his personal compensation and the parlous financial situation of the FAI. Delaney's reputation as a great financial manager was left in tatters. He resigned under pressure, and the FAI was left hoping for a massive bail-out from the Irish taxpayer. 
 
In Champagne Football, Tighe and Rowan dig deep into the story of Delaney's career and of the FAI's slide into ruin. They show how he surrounded himself with people whose personal loyalty he could count on, and a board that failed to notice that the association's finances were shot. They detail Delaney's skilful cultivation of opinion-formers outside the FAI. And they document the culture of excess that Delaney presided over and benefited from, to the detriment of the organization he led. 
 
Champagne Football is a gripping, sometimes darkly hilarious and often enraging piece of reporting by the award-winning journalists who finally pulled back the curtain on the FAI's mismanagement.

Champagne Football

John Delaney and the Betrayal of Irish Football: The Inside Story

Roddy Collins

Paul Howard

Roddy Collins is a football man - now in the sixth decade of a career as a player (at sixteen clubs), manager (twelve clubs) and commentator. And he is a funny man: an unequalled raconteur with a sharp eye for the absurdities of the professional game and spectacular recall. He has made friends wherever he has gone, along with some high-quality enemies. When John Delaney said he could get Roddy a job if he'd just stop criticising him, Roddy replied that he'd 'rather dig holes in the road'. 
 
Now, with the brilliant Paul Howard, Roddy puts it all down on paper for the first time - the adventures, the rows and the craic - in what is not only one of the funniest but also one of the most eye-opening books ever written about professional football.

The Rodfather

Inside the Beautiful (Ugly, Ridiculous, Hilarious) Game

Shane Curran

In an age when sportsmen have perfected the art of saying nothing and suppressing any trace of personality, Shane 'Cake' Curran is a beacon of light: passionate, outspoken, utterly himself. As a rare two-code goalkeeper - for Roscommon in Gaelic football and for Athlone Town in soccer - he made his own rules, soloing mesmerisingly out of goal, inventing a new style of kicking tee, and famously poaching a penalty kick a teammate had lined up in the 1989 Connacht minor final. Brave, honest and hilarious, Cake tells the story of an Irish sportsman who has lived the dream in his own utterly distinctive way.

Cake

The Autobiography of a Passionate, Outspoken Sportsman and Entrepreneur

Duncan Ferguson

They don't make footballers - and football autobiographies - like this any more. The brutally honest, riotously entertaining story of the much-loved Everton legend and iconic Premier League bad boy. 
 
Praised by Wayne Rooney and Sir Alex Ferguson as one of the greatest and most passionate players to ever play the game, Duncan Ferguson, or Big Dunc as he is known, is larger than life in every sense. Measuring a towering 6 feet 4 inches in height, from the moment the striker emerged in British football in the 1990s, he was front and back page news. On the pitch, fans loved Duncan for his roguish charm, his thrilling goals and his total commitment in every game. Fighting tooth and nail, he was a born leader and took no prisoners. Like his rival Roy Keane, he played close to the limit, and often crossed it. Such as the time he was sentenced to 3 months in Glasgow’s toughest prison for headbutting an opponent – the first and only time a footballer has ever gone to jail for a crime committed on a football pitch. 
 
In BIG DUNC: The Upfront Autobiography, Duncan reveals, for the first time, the full story: the truth about his experiences in prison, his partying with African princes and Liverpool gangsters, his fighting with burglars, his making and losing a fortune, and how he turned his life around through his beloved Everton F.C.. In the process, the book sheds light on one of football’s most charismatic but notorious and enigmatic hardmen. Duncan has also been a manager and a coach. He is a pillar of the community in Merseyside, giving back to stricken children who share a similar tough upbringing to his own. Duncan's book takes readers on a rollercoaster ride of humour, drama and redemption. Buckle up.

BIG DUNC

The Upfront Autobiography

Giles Goodhead

Travelling football fanatic Giles Goodhead drags a series of unsuspecting friends and relatives to eight of the world's greatest derby games. From the noisiest (Barcelona) to the scariest (a toss-up between Istanbul and Glasgow) Us vs Them desribes the thrills of gate-crashing grudge matches in cities split by football. Eight unique trips add up to a highly entertaining commentary on football - and tribalism - around the world.

Us v Them

Journeys to the World's Greatest Football Derbies

When Saturday Comes

The best chants, the funniest nicknames, the greatest headlines and enough little-known facts to keep the average football supporter entertained - and entertaining - for several seasons. This is the story of the greatest game on earth, from 'abandoned matches' to 'Yeovil Town', via celebrity fans, mascots, punditry and superstitions, written from the fan's point of view and with a separate entry for every club in the English and Scottish leagues. 
 
Who cares why, if Torquay United's strikers had been more prolific in the 1950s, England may never have won the World Cup; or where football hooliganism actually began; or who the hell Captain Henry Blythe Thornhill Wakelam is? 
 
We do. Because as every true student of the game knows: it's important.

The Half Decent Football Book

Eamon Dunphy

"The best book about football I have read by someone who has actually played the game...everyone who has ever dreamt of a sporting career should read it" Nick Hornby 
 
The season began so well for the Republic of Ireland international midfielder Eamon Dunphy at Millwall -- and ended in disillusionment and being on the transfer list. In this classic memoir, he charts the progress of the team during a season that begins with such high hopes and is filled throughout with high drama. Populated with extraordinary characters -- and with access to the dressing room that would be impossible today -- Only a Game? is both a riveting read and an exceptional insight into professional sport.

Only a Game?

The Diary of a Professional Footballer

Nick Hornby

As a young boy, growing up in the Home Counties and watching his parents' marriage fall apart, Nick Hornby had little sense of home. Then his dad took him to Highbury. Arsenal's football ground would become the source of many of the strongest feelings he'd ever have: joy, humiliation, heartbreak, frustration and hope. 
 
In this now-classic book, he vividly depicts his troubled relationship with his father, his time as a teacher, and his first loves (after football), all through the prism of the game, as he insightfully and brilliantly explores obsession, and the way it can shape a life.

Fever Pitch

John Preston

Elton John

Britain in the 1970s was beset by unrest and unemployment. Meanwhile, Watford FC were floundering in 92nd place at the bottom of the entire Football League. Enter Elton John, now the most successful rockstar in the world and a lifelong fan of the club. 
 
Made in Watford is the remarkable story of Elton John's ownership of Watford Football Club and its transformational journey to the top of the first division under iconic manager Graham Taylor. Filled with incredible stories about legendary players and unlikely heroes, from Luther Blissett to Ross Jenkins, and a loveable supporting cast of eclectic characters, this a tribute to football's unlikeliest friendship and one of sport's great underdog stories.

Watford Forever

How Graham Taylor and Elton John Saved a Football Club, a Town and Each Other

Paul Mullin

The memoir from Wrexham's star player, Paul Mullin - as seen in Welcome to Wrexham, a Disney+ documentary series by Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney. 
 
In July 2021, shortly after being named League Two's Player of the Season and Golden Boot, Paul Mullin sent shockwaves through the EFL by taking a downwards move to National League team, Wrexham AFC. Since then, 'Super Paul Mullin' has helped transform the Wrexham team, scoring goal after goal, helping secure promotion, and capturing the imaginations of football fans across the world in the process. 
 
Here for the first time, Mullin tells his own story: his roots in Liverpool, the highs and lows of English football's promotion race, lessons learnt from his young son's Autism diagnosis, and what happens when Hollywood comes knocking at your door.

My Wrexham Story

The Inspirational Autobiography From The Beloved Football Hero

Amy Lawrence

In 2003-04, Arsenal overcame every conceivable challenge to complete a 38-game league without a single loss. It was a feat unequalled in modern football. But for Arsene Wenger's 'Invincibles', a team including legends Thierry Henry, Patrick Vieira and Dennis Bergkamp, it was a challenge that went far beyond sport. 
 
Based on exclusive players interviews, this definitive book relives the pivotal games and moments, and allows the Invincibles to tell their own story. It takes readers inside the locker room, to reveal the teamwork, the psychology and the struggle behind one of the greatest teams in history.

Invincible

Inside Arsenal's Unbeaten 2003-2004 Season

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