Anyone read "The Ball is Round" by David Goldblatt? I just picked it up and am completely immersed. It's basically an academic and comprehensive history of soccer and clocks in at 900 pages (although it reads so easily, you can probably plow through 100 pages a day). The introduction damn near brought a tear to my eye as Goldblatt poetically encapsulates why we like this sport. I'm still early into the book but I couldn't recommend it any more for fellow followers of this religion. http://www.amazon.com/Ball-Round-Global-History-Soccer/dp/1594482969/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books
Yes, I've read it. It's a very well research book, and is definitely worth reading. At times there is a bit too much of the social and political history of the period and not enough football, but overall it is very good.
About a third of the way through, I absolutely love it and strongly recommend it to anyone thirsty for a global historical analysis of the spread of the beautiful game.
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I'm about three-fourths of the way through and enjoying it immensely, though I was initially a little taken aback by how much of the stuff on Ajax (my favorite club) is more or less lifted directly from one of my all-time favorite books, David Winner's Brilliant Orange--I don't know enough to say whether the same is true of his accounts of other clubs/teams. Upon further reflection, there's no way he could have assembled this much info without relying heavily on secondary sources, so wotthehell. And sometimes I wonder whether the parallels between politics and football aren't a bit overstated, though again I'm not enough of an expert to judge. Overall, it's really an impressive job of pulling together a ton of information, and imo ought to be on every fan's bookshelf.
A bit late on this thread but can also say I really, really enjoyed this book. Just endless absorption in the sport, the politics, the culture. There is a great interview with the author on the podcast of the blog The Global Game. The link is about halfway down on the right. It's almost an hour long, really interesting. Funny thing after completing the book he basically couldn't watch soccer for a quite a while. Immersed himself in American sports of all things.
Great book, very well researched and the social/political commentary add to the understanding of the globalisation of the sport and in fact culture as well, very good read.