The Birth of Liverpool Football Club
by Alan Wilson
Vertical, £11.99
Reviewed by Rob Hughes
From WSC 297 November 2011
Liverpool first emerged, in true Adam and Eve style, from Everton's rib. A boardroom bust-up in 1892 led Anfield owner John Houlding to funnel his considerable wealth into a brand new team, taking his ball (and his ground) with him. Thus Liverpool FC was born, while Everton, having called Anfield home for eight years, were packed off to Goodison.
Growing Up Fast
by Theo Walcott
Bantam Press, £18.99
Reviewed by Cameron Carter
From WSC 297 November 2011
This is not a life of peaks and troughs. There are no regrets, no fatal flaws, no falls from grace – just a rapid rise to the top by a polite young man from Newbury. Theo Walcott's story is an incredible one, but only from one angle: his youth.
Arsenal Football Club
From Woolwich to Whittaker
by Brian Glanville
GCR Books, £11.95
Reviewed by David Stubbs
From WSC 296 Oct 2011
Over The Bar
Memories of My Career with Arsenal and Wales
by Jack Kelsey
GCR Books, £12.95
Reviewed by David Stubbs
From WSC 296 Oct 2011
Both of these titles involve journalist and lifelong Arsenal supporter Brian Glanville, who began his literary career aged just 19 when he persuaded Cliff Bastin to allow him to ghostwrite his memoirs. In 1952, aged just 21, Glanville wrote one of the first histories of Arsenal, from 1886 to 1952, when, unbeknown to the author, his team were about to embark on one of the most fallow periods of their history.
One Football Fan’s Fear of Success
by John Crace
Constable, £12.99
Reviewed by Nick Dorrington
From WSC 296 October 2011
Very soon into their life every Tottenham supporter is indoctrinated in the “Spurs way” and told stories of the brilliance of the Bill Nicholson-led 1961 Double-winning side of Dave Mackay and Danny Blanchflower, Cliff Jones and John White. To correlate this glorious past to teams featuring the likes of Jason Dozzell, Ramon Vega and Timothée Atouba is a task beyond all but the most blindly loyal.
American Soccer's History of Missed Opportunities and Lost Causes
by David Wangerin
Temple University, £19.99
Reviewed by Ian Plenderleith
From WSC 296 October 2011
Long is the history of failed football ventures in the US, and short is the list of writers who have been prepared to document them for the benefit of a doubtless unsuspecting world. In this follow-up to his excellent history of US football, the WSC-published Soccer In A Football World, David Wangerin focuses on a handful of the key characters and eras that were central to some of the game's false dawns in a country whose footballing possibilites have always loomed over the world game like a potential new age. Or potential apocalypse, depending on your view of US hegemony.