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'I've seen things no one else has seen in football.' Jermaine Pennant is one of English football's most controversial figures. Love him or loathe him, there is no ignoring the story he has to tell. Raised by a mother who faked her own death to abandon her black baby, and a father who kept guns and Class A drugs in the house meant that life's options for a young Jermaine were limited. Yet he saw professional football as his way out, and took his chance, emerging to be one of England's most gifted young footballers. A true prodigy, Jermaine climbed to the pinnacle of his sport to compete for the highest honours with legends at Arsenal and Liverpool. The boy from one of England's toughest neigh...
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£80 million in debt and with financial meltdown a matter of weeks away, in July 2003 Chelsea Football Club were saved from almost certain penury by Roman Abramovich, a reclusive young billionaire that few people outside his native Russia had heard of. Making History, Not Reliving It recounts the first decade of Roman’s rule in London mirrored against a backdrop of an ever-changing, social-media-driven, angst and envy-ridden world where the revolving door of change seems to spin as fast as that of the manager’s at Stamford Bridge. Granular season-by-season detail of exactly how Chelsea amassed three league titles, four FA Cups, two League Cups, a Champions League and a Europa League in ten eventful years is entertainingly supplemented with news and entertainment bulletins and rounded off with enlightening and diverse points of view provided by a broad cross section of supporters unified by their blissful enjoyment of the desperate jealousy of rival fans now only able to relive the history that their own precious club’s once made.
When love walks in the room … Awards, fame, wealth … Bono has it all. But the biggest rock star in the world has something more important, something that has guided every step of his success: faith in God. From growing up in Ireland during deadly times to performing on the largest stages in the world, Bono’s beliefs have kept him grounded and focused on what truly matters. Whether using his voice to captivate an audience or to fight for justice and healing in Africa, Bono is a champion of the lost and a hero to those who long for harmony.
"Who Killed English Football?" is the product of personal research born out of a mixture of curiosity and frustration. This book was prompted by the inexorable decline of English football performance at European and World Cup events. Analysing the causes of such deterioration, simple but worrying truths are unearthed and laid bare. Club vs Country rivalry, a surfeit of money, a chimaera-like governance, "embedded" media and a foreign player invasion are all contributors to the slow death of the "beautiful game". There might be a glimmer of hope ... provided reality is acknowledged and palliative remedies introduced.
'Essential reading for players, fans and coaches' - Steven Gerrard 'A cracking read' - Chris Evans 'I couldn't put it down' - Joey Barton What are the greatest games ever played? From Jurgen Klopp to Gary Neville, Xavi to David Beckham, Jamie Carragher speaks with teammates, rivals, managers and legends of the sport to identify and analyse football's greatest encounters. As Carra and his contributors take you into the dressing rooms and out onto the pitches of the world's most celebrated stadiums, they relive some of the defining moments of their playing careers as well as many more from the greatest football matches ever played - from title deciders and cup finals to against-all-odds comebacks, tactical masterclasses and old school classics. Packed full of hilarious stories, exclusive anecdotes and refreshing appraisals, in The Greatest Games Jamie Carragher takes you into the heart of these matches, revealing new insights into the teams, players and coaches that have shaped football.
From the Middle-Ages onwards, London’s notorious Bedlam lunatic hospital saw the city’s ‘mad’ locked away in dank cells, neglected and abused and without any real cure and little comfort. The unprecedented growth of the metropolis after the Industrial Revolution saw a perceived ‘epidemic’ of madness take hold, with ‘county asylums’ seen by those in power as the most humane or cost-effective way to offer the mass confinement and treatment believed necessary. The county of Middlesex – to which London once belonged – would build and open three huge county asylums from 1831, and when London became its own county in 1889 it would adopt all three and go on to build or run anoth...
It was in 1978, that Viv Anderson became the first black player to be selected for England. It is a measure of how life for black footballers has improved that in 2002 Arsenal could field nine non-white players at Leeds’ Elland Road ground without comment. A tenth, Jermaine Pennant, came on as a substitute.While it would be wrong to claim that racism has been entirely banished from English football, the problem is not as bad as on the European continent.Rodney Hinds, sports editor of The Voice, Britain’s leading black newspaper, examines the attitudes of the football establishment over the years and talks to players who had to suffer abuse from visiting fans and players, and sometimes their own team-mates.
I learnt that it is faith that decides whether something will happen or not. At the age of eight, Kaká already knew what it he wanted in life: to play soccer, and only soccer. He started playing in front of his friends and family, but when he suffered a crippling injury doctors told him he would never play again. Through faith and perseverance Kaká recovered, and today he plays in front of thousands of fans every year. As the 2007 FIFA World Player of the Year and winner of the Ballon d’Or, this midfielder for Real Madrid has become one of the most recognized faces on the soccer field.
How technologies can get it wrong in sports, and what the consequences are—referees undermined, fans heartbroken, and the illusion of perfect accuracy maintained. Good call or bad call, referees and umpires have always had the final say in sports. Bad calls are more visible: plays are televised backward and forward and in slow motion. New technologies—the Hawk-Eye system used in tennis and cricket, for example, and the goal-line technology used in English football—introduced to correct bad calls sometimes get it right and sometimes get it wrong, but always undermine the authority of referees and umpires. Bad Call looks at the technologies used to make refereeing decisions in sports, an...