Search: ' Borussia Dortmund'
Stories
There were mixed feelings from our writers about Euro 2016, while the child sex abuse scandal and Chapecoense plane crash were low points for many
by Elmar Neveling
Ebury Press, £12.99
Reviewed by Rob Hughes
From WSC 351 May 2016
Attempting to write a biography of someone with an ongoing career means that your work is never quite done. As a contributor to DFB Bundesliga magazine, Elmar Neveling has been well placed to chart the rise of Jürgen Klopp over the past decade. A book published in Germany in 2011 Echte Liebe (Real Love) brought Klopp’s achievements with Borussia Dortmund into some kind of focus, but landed between back-to-back Bundesliga titles. A new version, published four years later, was able to evaluate his achievements (including the German double and reaching a Champions League final) from a better perspective. Klopp’s decision to cut short his post-Dortmund sabbatical has now necessitated an extra chapter in this English version of the book, probably earlier than Neveling anticipated, to cover the start of his Liverpool tenure.
by Philip Kerr
Head of Zeus, £7.99
Reviewed by Huw Richards
From WSC 348 February 2016
Fiction with a sporting setting is notoriously variable in quality. Binary win-lose outcomes reduce the scope for ambiguity and authors may either be poor writers or under-informed. Philip Kerr sidesteps all of these traps with ease. His fictional club, London City, provides the context for crime rather than a narrative end in itself.
Poland, the Euro 2012 co-hosts are struggling to find a common language in the dressing room, writes Liam Nolan
During the past six months, Poland’s coach Franciszek Smuda has faced a barrage of domestic criticism for trying to lure footballers with Polish ancestry to play for the national team. Five of Smuda’s starting 11 were either born or raised abroad. French born Ludovic Obraniak (Bordeaux) and Damien Perquis (Sochaux) cannot speak Polish, and three German-Poles – Eugen Polanski, Adam Matuszczyk and Sebastian Boenisch – feel much more at ease speaking in German.