The Glory Game (Mainstream Sport)

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The lament for football’s lost golden age and the belief that commercial interests have sullied the game are nothing new – Willy Meisl’s 1960 book Soccer Revolution argues that the liberalisation of the offside law in 1925, which played to the popular demand for more goals, was the beginning of the end. However, Conn’s 2004 book is a heartfelt account of the increasingly rapid changes of the previous couple of decades. “It is deeply frustrating,” he writes, “seeing the national game revel in a boom, which could take it so far, yet drive itself so needlessly into dysfunction and failure.” His career encompassed both the “win or lose, we're on the booze” culture of the ’80s and the mineral water/steamed broccoli of Arsene’s Arsenal. His harrowing account of his descent into alcoholism (including bed-wetting and clothes-soiling) drew criticism from those with weaker constitutions. The majority were simply dumbfounded by what they read, and concurred with Wenger’s comment: “Tony, I’m amazed you’re still actually with us.” Jon Spurling

Davies, Hunter Joe Kinnear: Still Crazy - Kinnear, Joe; Davies, Hunter

Hunter Davies’ childhood lived amongst the post-war dirt and grime of Carlisle was immediately hailed as a classic memoir from one of Britain’s foremost columnists of the past half century. The Co-op’s Got Bananas! left our protagonist at the cusp of working for one of the world’s greatest newspapers – The Sunday Times .

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Staggeringly raw and uncompromisingly revealing. I was expecting some unconvenient truths about the game to be shown, but the ammount of darkness that this book portrays still surprised me. I know that you're not supposed to apply your own moral standars on past times, and the 70's had things our time doesn't but still: the energy around Spurs in '72 comes across as outright destructive. Davies mercilessly shows how the players suffer not only from their own fears and prejudices, but also from the reactionary, judgemental and emotionally arid culture around them. As a Spurs fan I've learned to consider Bill Nicholson a "club legend", but after reading Davies' depiction of his almost pathological criticism of people around him, and his contempt of weakness and vulnerability, I feel less inclined to do so. I don't know if things have gotten better since then at Spurs and clubs like them, but in any case I'm glad I wasn't there. There is no way that a writer these days could possibly do what I did in The Glory Game,” explains Hunter Davies. “He or she wouldn’t be able to get past the minefield of agents, lawyers and officials.” Book Club Edition. Very good cloth copy in a good if somewhat edge-torn (with significant loss) and dust-dulled dust-wrapper now mylar-sleeved. Remains well-preserved overall. Physical description: xii, 332, [16] p.; ill.; 22 cm. Notes: Includes index. Subjects: Tottenham Hotspur Football Club. Association football tottenham hotspur football club, 1971-1972. Genre: Non-fiction. 1 Kg. During the Beatles sessions for the Let It Be album , the Beatles recorded a song called "There You Go Eddie" about Hunter Davies that appears on bootlegs. It was not officially released. [9]

Glory Game by Hunter Davies | Goodreads The Glory Game by Hunter Davies | Goodreads

Davies has stated that the first football team he supported was Queen of the South, when he lived in Dumfries. [1] After moving to Carlisle aged 11, he adopted English Football League club Carlisle United. [11] Davies joined the sixth form at Carlisle Grammar School and was awarded a place at University College, Durham to read for an honours degree in History, but after his first year he switched to a general arts course. He gained his first writing experience as a student, contributing to the university newspaper, Palatinate, where one of his fellow student journalists was the future fashion writer Colin McDowell. After completing his degree course he stayed on at Durham for another year to gain a teaching diploma and avoid National Service. Hailed as probably the best book about soccer ever written, 'The Glory Game' gives a unique insight into the inner workings of a major-league soccer club. The exposure of the dreadful state of English social attitudes; whether it be about gender roles or sexuality or race relations. This tells of a white male only world that was becoming at odds with the progressive and inclusive world that was over-taking it. There are numerous cringe-worthy sections and several that would have been indefensible even in the dark ages of 1971. When I talk about the soul, I mean the part of football that is more than business,” he continues. “The soul is the passion and the loyalty of fans, but it is also the joy to be found in playing the game. As other collective institutions disappear, football clubs are becoming an increasingly central part of people’s identity, and that’s why we see these heroic struggles to save clubs when they are threatened.”Books on the business of football can be unreadably dry, but The Beautiful Game? is passionate and bleakly humorous. Quite aside from the depth of the research, what sets Conn’s book above Tom Bower’s Broken Dreams, a mystifying winner of the William Hill’s Sports Book of the Year Award in 2003, is the sense that he really cares. Broken Dreams was riddled with errors, both of fact and of spirit; Conn, simply by noting, for instance, that fans know intuitively why Notts County matter, taps into a depth of tradition of which Bower has no grasp. Bower just says football is in a very bad way; Conn tells us why it is worth putting right. Jonathan Wilson He was helped by having the 2002 World Cup and the rumpus surrounding Roy Keane’s departure from the squad as a starting point, but by the end that is just one issue among many. Football happens to have been Quinn’s life, but his autobiography is just as much about regret, about moving on and about remaining a decent man in a world that is profoundly indecent. Jonathan Wilson I was hoping for a bit more on his time with the Beatles and the 1960s more generally. Hunter touches on these areas but as he has written so many books, and newspaper columns, and done many other interesting things, he doesn't dwell on anything for long. The only subject that gets extensively covered is his life with Margaret. During the summer months they lived in their second home near Loweswater in the Lake District. [17] It was sold in July 2016. [18] His autobiography The Beatles, Football and Me was published in 2007. [3] A long-term resident of London, Davies' third adopted team is Tottenham Hotspur. [12] In international football, Davies supports Scotland. [13] Personal life [ edit ]