The Dark History Of The World Cup
by Jon Spurling
Vision Sports, £14.99
Reviewed by Terry Staunton
From WSC 281 July 2010
Zaire full-back Mwepu Ilunga's odd behaviour at the 1974 finals, breaking off from the defensive wall to boot the ball away just as Brazil's Rivelino is about to take a free-kick, has gone down as one of the most comical scenes in World Cup history. It is replayed time and again on the obligatory TV clips shows in the run-up to each subsequent tournament.
A History In Ten Matches
by Jonathan Wilson
Orion, £14.99
Reviewed by Harry Pearson
From WSC 281 July 2010
Jonathan Wilson produces so much high-class writing about football that, had I not met him on a couple of occasions, I'd be tempted to believe he was actually a workers' collective. The Anatomy of England is Wilson's fourth book on the game and while the subject – the England national team in all its splendid misery – might seem less exotic, esoteric and altogether more familiar than those covered in his excellent Behind the Curtain and Inverting the Pyramid the result is every bit as thought-provoking and entertaining.
The Autobiography
by Viv Anderson with Lynton Guest
Right Recordings, £17.99
Reviewed by Al Needham
From WSC 280 June 2010
Viv Anderson, as we all know, was the first black player to turn out for the England first team so you’d expect his biography to be a tale of personal redemption and inner dignity in the face of the monkey-whoopers and banana-throwers – A Rangy Lope To Freedom, if you will.
The Autobiography
by Dwight Yorke
Pan Books, £7.99
Reviewed by Damon Green
From WSC 280 June 2010
Tits. He's seen a few. Especially in the latter days of his career. Graeme Souness tried – he says – to break his leg during a five-a-side game. Roy Keane has the management skills of a psychopathic Mr Bean. And Peter Andre has no idea how close he came to being strangled to death.
by Graham McColl
Bantam Press, £12.99
Reviewed by Jonathan O'Brien
From WSC 280 June 2010
By the law of averages, a sizeable number of you who are reading this will be having a flutter on the World Cup. So, before you put your money down on Spain (who are forever only one Sergio Ramos backpass away from potential disaster), or Brazil (whose star playmaker has endured a poor season), or even England, have a leaf through this entertaining look back through World Cup history that passes itself off as an instruction manual for managers hoping to bring home the big one.