SPORTS BOOKS 2010:From legendary jockey Bobby Beasley to the insights of how to win a Ryder Cup, there has never been such a diverse offering of sports books for Christmas consumption
SOCCER
John Giles: A Football Man(Hachette Books Ireland, €17.50- €26.40). There's nothing really to rival this for the title of 2010's best Irish soccer autobiography but then it would have taken a pretty good book to even give it a run for its money.
Giles, of course, is something of an institution here, the brief dip in his popularity that inevitably accompanied the tail-end of his time in charge of the Republic of Ireland team long forgotten by fans who tend to like the Dubliner every bit as much as they respect his many achievements in and around the game.
Here, we get an account stretching from his early days as a soccer-mad youngster growing up and playing ball on the streets of the capital right through to his remarkably successful move into punditry that reads a little like the fireside chat you’d rather fancy having with him yourself.
Declan Lynch handles it all with admirable subtlety, letting his subject’s natural humour and feel for a story shine through as Giles sheds new light on one of the most intriguing eras in the recent history of the English game and one of the greatest ever careers in the Irish one.
Stuttgart to Saipanby Miguel Delaney (Mentor, €16.99). An interesting account this of the Irish team's most successful years told through interviews with a cross section of the players that featured along the way. The better players don't always make for the most compelling accounts of what went on during the Jack Charlton and Mick McCarthy eras but many have something to say and Delaney ensures that it's all highly readable.
Liam Brady, Mark Lawrenson and Packie Bonner are amongst those who contribute to a book that follows a fairly straightforward player-per-chapter format.
Inevitably, a lot of the old stuff gets another run-out but there are some new takes too and one or two of the pieces, like the Alan Kernaghan one that primarily deals with the 1994 campaign, his own decision to play for the Republic of Ireland after effectively being refused the opportunity to line out for the North and, very briefly, his eventful club career, will leave you wanting more.
Some of the games covered in some detail by Delaney, meanwhile, are also dealt with by his Sunday Tribunecolleagues Gerard Siggins and Malachy Clerkin in their impressive trawl through the sometimes compelling, sometimes quirky history of the Irish team's home through the past few decades: Lansdowne Road: The Stories, The Matches, the Greatest Days.
Gods v Mortalsby Paul Keane (ISP, €16.99). Irish clubs won far more games over the past decade than they had in all the previous years of their involvement in European club competition and until the current financial crisis started to undermine the progress being made through full-time and summer football, it seemed plausible that future encounters between the best League of Ireland clubs and the giants of the English, Spanish and Italian games might have a less lopsided look about them.
Here, though, Keane provides accounts of 10 of the most memorable ties from days when, psychologically at least, the gap was difficult to overcome and while there are some decent results – Athlone’s draw with Milan and Bohemians’ defeat of Rangers amongst them – the volume essentially deals with that staple of the Irish European campaign, heroic failure.
Keane, though, has done the rounds well, tracking down a healthy sprinkling of the participants whose accounts, in particular, of the early games involving Shamrock Rovers, Waterford United and Athlone against Manchester United (the first two) and Milan make for good reading.
There’s a lot of pretty broad context regarding the clubs and seasons, though, and the absence of a little more behind-the-scenes stuff from trips away that had a habit in those days of being quite eventful, is perhaps something of a lost opportunity.
Also taking a glance back at an aspect of the Irish game’s history is Trevor Keane who has done a similar sort of job in terms of the stories of the various national team managers. Again there is some context and quotes from those who had first-hand experience of working with the likes of Liam Tuohy, Johnny Giles and Brian Kerr.
Trautman's Journey: From Hitler Youth to FA Cup Legendby Catrine Clay (Yellow Jersey Press, €21.50). If the Johnny Giles biography provides a fairly compelling account of a life spent in football then the most remarkable thing about Bert Trautman's book is that playing 16 minutes of an FA Cup final with a broken neck somehow turns out to be one of the less interesting aspects of his life; a fact he apparently grew rather weary of explaining while undertaking recent promotional work in Britain.
The former Manchester City goalkeeper started his adult life as a soldier – and a pretty committed one at that – in the German paratroops and served on both the eastern and western fronts.
In this book, well written by Catrine Clay, whose previous works has been generally unrelated to sport, Trautman is frank about his early enthusiasm for what he, like many others, imagined would be a grand adventure and the altogether more horrific reality of it all.
There were certainly elements of adventure to Trautman’s story, though, for he was captured by and escaped from both the Russians and the French resistance before walking into a trap laid by British soldiers who greeted him with the wonderfully chipper: “Hello Fritz; fancy a cup of tea?” He went on to embrace the culture of his captors and having been awarded the Iron Cross for his efforts on the battlefield, he subsequently got an OBE for work aimed at building bridges between the Germans and English. It’s good stuff and, in case you’re wondering, there’s some football in there too.
The Football Bookby David Goldblatt and Johnny Acton (DK, €17.70-€26.40). The invention of video games along with the advent of the internet and countless club specific publications have between them badly undermined the kids' end of the football publishing market but a few choices remain for those adults hell bent on seeing their youngster read something.
Probably the best of the lot is The Football Book which contains a wealth of information on the game, its clubs and competitions.
It’s well illustrated, enormously informative and packed with the sort of stats that youngsters of a particular age are going to delight in quoting back to you so be prepared. There’s even a decent explanation of the game’s rules which, you suspect, quite a few of those involved in various strands of the game could do with rereading from time to time.
This has been going for a few years now but the latest edition has been updated to take account of the 2010 World Cup. It’s a little on the pricey side but then there’s a good deal more to it than there is to most of the cheaper alternatives.
Emmet Malone, Irish Times soccer correspondent
GOLF
Monty's Manor: Colin Montgomerie and the Ryder Cupby Iain Carter (Yellow Jersey Press, €20). Monty's Manor is the book that needed to be written. With the exception of Seve Ballesteros, Colin Montgomerie epitomises the Ryder Cup like no other European and if his winning captaincy at Celtic Manor in October turns out to be the final chapter, then the Scot signed off in the best possible manner.
Iain Carter is BBC 5 Live’s golf correspondent, who with his easy writing style, recounts Monty’s every step in the Ryder Cup since making his debut in the hostile 1991 “War on the Shore” matches at Kiawah Island. With back story complete, Carter left the lengthiest final chapter of his first book to recount the unfolding drama in the Usk Valley, where the 47-year-old left “no stone unturned” to ensure the famous gold trophy remained this side of the Atlantic.
Carter’s work enjoyed close access to his primary subject and lively comment from Monty’s peers, plus insight into the inner mechanics of how a Ryder Cup captain is chosen. The author also addressed “difficult” issues as Monty can be an aloof and sometimes controversial character as much as he is charming and charismatic.
The book, for example, refers to the “Jakartagate” ball drop incident; his stand-off with Sandy Lyle during the 2009 British Open at Turnberry and touches on the “unsubstantiated” reports regarding his private life in the lead up to Celtic Manor.
The foreword by Ballesteros and afterword by match-winner Graeme McDowell were fitting bookends for the man involved in nine Ryder Cup – including his captaincy – while part of five winning teams as a player.
Paul Gallagher, Irish Times golf writer
RUGBY
Blue Blood: the Bernard Jackman autobiography(ISP, €19.99). The vagrants and geniuses who operate within the cocoon of sports hackery could spend a lifetime banging their heads off the dressingroom door, sustaining multiple concussions in the process, without ever providing the insight Bernard Jackman achieves in this diary that doubles up as an autobiography.
For those yet to read this book’s opening line (“Everyone is afraid of Michael Cheika”), it seems strange that this undoubtedly brave, yet ultimately flawed hooker – he admits himself that throwing was his Achilles heel – managed to get a book deal at all. But the manner in which Jackman shines a light into the back rooms of Leinster rugby provide echoes of the mediocre pitcher Jim Bouton’s startling behind-the-scenes look at the 1969 New York Yankees.
Jackman also expresses what seems an unhealthy obsession with hating Munster that should nevertheless endear him further to the Blue Army, even if other revelations in the decently-paced 247 pages will not bring a ringing endorsement from former team-mates or coaches: haymakers at Irish training sessions that send Denis Leamy and Ryan Caldwell into frightening spasms; the patent lack of attention on the Leinster scrum (“20 minutes on Tuesday and five minutes on Thursday”); the hatred that existed between assistant coaches Mike Brewer and David Knox; or a belief that Michael Bradley adopted a fatuous and disingenuous approach during his time at Connacht.
The most alarming information is the 20 concussions Jackman managed to hide from the Irish and Leinster medical staff over a three-year period.
Cheika’s dictatorial stewardship, which did yield a Heineken Cup remember, is best summed up by the classic “I decide when you retire” line that the Australian delivered as he blew his top when Jackman attempted to retire after defeat to Toulouse in the Heineken Cup semi-final because of buckling knees and eight bangs to the head in one campaign.
Those responsible for oiling the Leinster machine also receive a fair amount of body blows from Jackman as he writes about contractual feet-dragging and lack of communication, especially evident in the second-handed manner the legendary Mal O’Kelly was informed he would be put out to pasture. “What are the young lads like the McFaddens and O’Malleys going to think when they see Leinster treating players like this at the end of their careers?”
In Red Blooded: the Alan Quinlan story(ISP, €19.99) the Munster warhorse keeps most of the private team conversations just that in Red Blooded but Alan Quinlan's memoir certainly has its moments, like tales of his wild youth in Tipperary, particularly the "hatchet" incident when a simmering local feud got way out of hand after Quinlan was compelled to intercede during a late-night row outside a chipper.
The Lions tour that never was and his subsequent descent into depression is also, perhaps cathartically, revisited. Having been suspended for making contact with Leo Cullen’s eye during the 2009 Heineken Cup semi-final defeat to Leinster at Croke Park, Quinlan tells of a surprisingly heart-warming return from the brink, undoubtedly assisted by his relationship with young son AJ.
The last of a dying breed, Quinlan brings us from the amateur days with Clanwilliam and Shannon all the way along Munster’s European odyssey. It started for real in Perpignan in 1998 when Peter Clohessy, flanked by Quinlan and Mick Galway, almost sparked a riot by flipping local hecklers “the bird”. On the post-game coach ride the Claw reacted to Declan Kidney’s no-drink edict by saying: “We’re all going on the piss, as soon as we get back to the hotel.”
Quinlan’s at-times tempestuous relationship with Kidney is examined and we learn that only for a timely intervention by Brian O’Brien his chequered career could have ended before it began. “‘I’m sick of this crap, I’m going to bust his head and I’m going to kill him,’ were my exact words,” Quinlan writes. But that was back in the 1990s. By the time Kidney sits him down in November 2009 to all but end his international career, a level of mutual admiration had clearly developed.
Multiple injuries and the occasional suspension have failed to finish off Quinlan. For that, the supporters of Munster and Ireland, certainly after his shoulder-busting try against Argentina in 2003, can be grateful. Paul O’Connell said in the foreword: “I have never played, known or seen anyone play rugby like Alan Quinlan. He is the life and soul of the dressing room but, when a match starts, the game takes over his life and soul.”
Gavin Cummiskey, Irish Times sports writer
RACING
When Bobby Met Christy: The story of Bobby Beasley and a wayward horseby Declan Colley (Collins Press, €14.99). Seabiscuit has nothing on this gritty tale of an unlikely comeback where, as the title suggests, a down-and-out jockey meets a brilliant brute of a horse. Bobby Beasley, who died in 2008, was one of the acclaimed riders of the 1950s and 1960s. He had wins in the big three of the jumps calendar – Cheltenham Gold Cup (1959), Champion Hurdle (1960) and Grand National (1961) – before falling to alcohol addiction, losing his job as A stable jockey in the UK and retiring back to Ireland in his early 30s.
You can guess the story didn’t end there and Beasley, in an extraordinary comeback battling his addiction and his weight, returned to the track in the early 1970s.
A chance but skilful ride on Norwegian Flag at Leopardstown in 1971 brought him back into the limelight before he joined Pat Taaffe’s yard. Here began his partnership with the headstrong Captain Christy which led to victory in the 1974 Gold Cup, five years after his retirement, in what is regarded as one of the finest rides in race history.
Impressively heavy on comment from trainers, jockeys and stable hands, the book is as much about the horse as the jockey, which is just as well as Beasley’s chapters do not make for easy reading.
Beasley’s career is a long road to an ultimately warming, but not Hollywood, ending.
Ruby: The Autobiographyby Ruby Walsh with Malachy Clerkin (Orion Books, £18.99) shows us that the jockey is a straightforward guy. He admits that, sometimes, he can come across as a little short but he doesn't apologise for it. He just doesn't see the point in giving a punter a tip he doesn't believe in or answering "silly" questions after a race (Was he sorry he didn't chose Denman instead of Kauto Star in the 2008 Gold Cup? "Was it not pretty self-evident?"). He does sometimes feel bad about giving a smart answer but mostly, Walsh is an ambitious guy who doesn't have time for messing around.
And with a career that includes Grand National wins on Papillion and Hegehunter, Gold Cups with Kauto Star and Cheltenham leading jockey awards, he can be excused the odd short moment. It is with his straight-forward manner that Walsh charts his racing life from the early days riding for his dad, Ted Walsh, to getting started with Willie Mullins and onto his rides for Paul Nicholls.
An articulate narrative, the chronology is at times confusing but as he moves from career highs to the lows, Walsh’s honesty is compelling. Though not overly sentimental about horses – if you have livestock, you’ll lose stock – his affection and admiration for his family, fellow jockeys and trainers is warming.
What is important in life must be easy to recognise when you’ve broken dislocated or shattered your ankle, leg, hips, wrist, arm, shoulders, collar bone, several vertebrae and lost your spleen in the course of your job.
When he speaks of the tragic loss of Kieran Kelly in 2003, it’s also easy to see why Walsh believes Irish racing authorities need to do more for jockeys. Walsh’s descriptions of races and tactics are the highlight and will satisfy racegoers until he returns to the track next month.
Leonie Corcoran, Irish Times journalist
