Will this review appear???, 29 Dec 2008

What a Waste, to quote the man himself.Lamenting the passage of time he allowed to snub his one time friend Mr.Taylor. The Partnership they both enjoyed went the way so many do as one takes the other for granted or rifts occur and eventually parts them. Humble beginnings saw them reach for the sky shooting for the top with unerring accuracy.
It's ironic that his short time at Leeds was over shadowed by his predecessor, Revie. Clough felt his omnipresence like a resident ghost but this would also be the legacy he left at Forest. I also feel that what Clough despised in Revie was a reflection of his own failings. Clough accused Revie of cheating with bribery of referees but when you read about a suitcase full of money..around £15,000 then their traits were quite similar.
A compulsive read which Hamilton has more than done justice to.

Genius, 09 Oct 2008
This book is fantastic. Not a biography, not exactly a memoir, but instead a series of reflections of twenty years spent with Ol Big Ead himself. Clough was a one off - brilliant, impossible, bonkers, infuriating, despicable, loveable, untameable. He took a nothing provincial club and went and won the European Cup. Twice. Unbelieveable.

And this book does the man justice. Crucially, it also does Peter Taylor justice; describing their symbiotic partnership. It also brings back a real nostalgia for the times when footballers weren't pampered prima donnas earning £150k a week. They liked a pint, and a fag, when apprentices had to clean the pros boots, and the game was simpler, less bloated. And when there was room for real characters. And this is a loving but seemingly honest portrait of the biggest character of them all. Demands to be read alongside "The Damned United".

The best of the Clough books, 11 Sep 2008
Just when you thought everything that could be written about Brian Clough had been written, along comes Duncan Hamilton and trumps the lot of them. There are very few, if any, people that stayed with Clough throughout his time at Forest, and no one had the access to Cloughie that Hamilton enjoyed.

To say the book is about Clough, however, is a bit misleading. It's more about his relationship with Hamilton, and how he plays the father figure to the young Nottingham Evening Post journalist. One review criticises the book for going into Clough's more unsavoury characteristics - the drink, the bullying, the whole treatment of Peter Taylor - but I applaud Hamilton for this. In revealing Clough's flaws, you see the vulnerability of the man, making him more human and endearing in the process, rather than the quote machine that others writers have presented him as. Hamilton never pretends to know what Clough was thinking - as David Peace did in the inferior, over-rated Damned United - and indeed Clough's unpredictability is a central theme to the book. Hamilton simply presents the facts as he saw them.

There will never be another Brian Clough, more's the pity, but Duncan Hamilton has provided us with a fitting testament to the man's career. The book is as good as sports writing gets, and it was fully deserving of its William Hill Sports Book of the Year award. Cloughie's character and legend are so strong that there will be dozens of books written about him in the years to come, but none will come close to this fine work.

A Big Story..., 16 Jul 2008
Excellent, straightforward sports biography, distinguished by Hamilton's closeness to his subject and the resulting intimacy of the portrait. No tricks, no fiction or imagined scenes, just sensitive writing and informed analysis of the Clough career and of a very different time in British football - a big enough story in its own right to require very little embroidery.

Duncan Hamilton makes no bones about how fortunate he was to be allowed unparalleled access to the force of nature that was Brian Clough. The portrait that emerges seems to come from something for which 'love' is maybe the only appropriate word; it's to Hamilton's credit that it never seems like obsession as, throughout, he is remarkably clear-eyed about Clough's weaknesses as well as his astonishing triumphs. The excellent and detailed accounts of how Clough took not one but two poor-to-middling English clubs to the heights of European glory (a feat that one struggles to imagine being repeated today) are balanced by an understanding of his very human insecurities and frailties, and by an increasingly dominant subtext - a (literally) sobering account of how low even a character as powerful as Clough could be laid by alcohol.


His favourite word was`s*ithouse`!, 09 Jul 2008
This is one of the most enjoyable books I have ever read. I am old enough to remember Clough at his managerial peak in the seventies. What he managed to achieve at two relatively small clubs will never be repeated. Also, I had often wondered why he and his friend/assistant Peter Taylor fell out and Duncan Hamilton explains the whole sorry tale. Do yourself a favour and buy this book.

Will this review appear???, 29 Dec 2008

What a Waste, to quote the man himself.Lamenting the passage of time he allowed to snub his one time friend Mr.Taylor. The Partnership they both enjoyed went the way so many do as one takes the other for granted or rifts occur and eventually parts them. Humble beginnings saw them reach for the sky shooting for the top with unerring accuracy.
It's ironic that his short time at Leeds was over shadowed by his predecessor, Revie. Clough felt his omnipresence like a resident ghost but this would also be the legacy he left at Forest. I also feel that what Clough despised in Revie was a reflection of his own failings. Clough accused Revie of cheating with bribery of referees but when you read about a suitcase full of money..around £15,000 then their traits were quite similar.
A compulsive read which Hamilton has more than done justice to.

Genius, 09 Oct 2008
This book is fantastic. Not a biography, not exactly a memoir, but instead a series of reflections of twenty years spent with Ol Big Ead himself. Clough was a one off - brilliant, impossible, bonkers, infuriating, despicable, loveable, untameable. He took a nothing provincial club and went and won the European Cup. Twice. Unbelieveable.

And this book does the man justice. Crucially, it also does Peter Taylor justice; describing their symbiotic partnership. It also brings back a real nostalgia for the times when footballers weren't pampered prima donnas earning £150k a week. They liked a pint, and a fag, when apprentices had to clean the pros boots, and the game was simpler, less bloated. And when there was room for real characters. And this is a loving but seemingly honest portrait of the biggest character of them all. Demands to be read alongside "The Damned United".

The best of the Clough books, 11 Sep 2008
Just when you thought everything that could be written about Brian Clough had been written, along comes Duncan Hamilton and trumps the lot of them. There are very few, if any, people that stayed with Clough throughout his time at Forest, and no one had the access to Cloughie that Hamilton enjoyed.

To say the book is about Clough, however, is a bit misleading. It's more about his relationship with Hamilton, and how he plays the father figure to the young Nottingham Evening Post journalist. One review criticises the book for going into Clough's more unsavoury characteristics - the drink, the bullying, the whole treatment of Peter Taylor - but I applaud Hamilton for this. In revealing Clough's flaws, you see the vulnerability of the man, making him more human and endearing in the process, rather than the quote machine that others writers have presented him as. Hamilton never pretends to know what Clough was thinking - as David Peace did in the inferior, over-rated Damned United - and indeed Clough's unpredictability is a central theme to the book. Hamilton simply presents the facts as he saw them.

There will never be another Brian Clough, more's the pity, but Duncan Hamilton has provided us with a fitting testament to the man's career. The book is as good as sports writing gets, and it was fully deserving of its William Hill Sports Book of the Year award. Cloughie's character and legend are so strong that there will be dozens of books written about him in the years to come, but none will come close to this fine work.

A Big Story..., 16 Jul 2008
Excellent, straightforward sports biography, distinguished by Hamilton's closeness to his subject and the resulting intimacy of the portrait. No tricks, no fiction or imagined scenes, just sensitive writing and informed analysis of the Clough career and of a very different time in British football - a big enough story in its own right to require very little embroidery.

Duncan Hamilton makes no bones about how fortunate he was to be allowed unparalleled access to the force of nature that was Brian Clough. The portrait that emerges seems to come from something for which 'love' is maybe the only appropriate word; it's to Hamilton's credit that it never seems like obsession as, throughout, he is remarkably clear-eyed about Clough's weaknesses as well as his astonishing triumphs. The excellent and detailed accounts of how Clough took not one but two poor-to-middling English clubs to the heights of European glory (a feat that one struggles to imagine being repeated today) are balanced by an understanding of his very human insecurities and frailties, and by an increasingly dominant subtext - a (literally) sobering account of how low even a character as powerful as Clough could be laid by alcohol.


His favourite word was`s*ithouse`!, 09 Jul 2008
This is one of the most enjoyable books I have ever read. I am old enough to remember Clough at his managerial peak in the seventies. What he managed to achieve at two relatively small clubs will never be repeated. Also, I had often wondered why he and his friend/assistant Peter Taylor fell out and Duncan Hamilton explains the whole sorry tale. Do yourself a favour and buy this book.

Just can not put it down, 15 Dec 2008
Excellent research into the last 50 years of LFC, brilliant analysis into the players and managers. Paul is a brilliant writer...an optimist and a realist all rolled into one.


John Furness loved Dynasty, 09 Nov 2008
An absolutely outstanding read, and the best attempt I've ever found (by a long chalk) to bring some science to the evaluation of team performance / achievement, individual player contribution and managerial capability. It generated some fascinating findings and interesting discussion points. The anecdotes were excellent too, and even for an avid fan like me of over 40 years standing there was information I hadn't been aware of and stories I hadn't heard. Congratulations on an amazing piece of work, that should be made compulsory reading for lazy journalists and TV pundits so that they might base their opinions on facts. John Furness

Essential Reading, 22 Oct 2008
Given the volume of material available on the unique history of Liverpool Football Club, it was difficult to imagine that a book celebrating 50 years of `Shankly's Liverpool' could offer such a fresh view of the goings-on at the club throughout that period. This idea of the book is not simply to discuss the many, many events that helped shape the `Dynasty', but to focus on the main people involved, and how each of them have contributed in their own way, to compare and contrast the reigns of each of the eight men in charge, but also to compare and contrast the strengths and weaknesses of the rivals at each time and put the successes and failures into their historical context.

Each of the managers are analyzed in an extremely comprehensive manner in several different categories, including the strength of the team they inherited, their record in the transfer market, their record on the pitch and, ultimately, their legacy. In order to help contrast the transfer records of the managers, he uses what I found to be a superbly detailed scoring system which helps to rank the best and the worst of each manager. Also on offer here is key information relating to spending power of the club as well as that of their rivals during each reign which leaves the reader with no doubt as to the difficulties facing each manager, without ever stopping to use the greater financial power of other clubs as an excuse for relative failure.

Another key point of the book is that none of the men under discussion are ever glamorized. While the strengths are discussed, so too are the weaknesses, none of which slip under the radar in a bid to compare one manager favourably against another. Despite the large quantity of data and statistics on offer in this book, it's main strength is in the narrative. Never does the reader feel weighed down by the data coming their way, rather, the facts and figures come in a manner that is extremely easy to follow and at times utterly fascinating. The structure of the book leads to a very comfortable read that I would recommend to anyone with even a passing interest in football.


Dynasty - a brilliant read, 16 Oct 2008
I've got all of Paul Tomkins' book and I have to say this is my favourite by far. Where previous books like Golden Past, Red Future and Red Revival used specific seasons as the background topic, Dynasty uses a few decades from the start of the Shankly era to the present day. I make a living working in statistics and whilst this book uses stats as evidence behind every point I particularly enjoyed this book purely as a review of the last 40 odd years in Liverpool history. Well written and nothing like as annoyingly partisan as a lot of books written by Liverpool fans this is a great read, one that I'd highly recommend

Superb Stuff for LFC die hard fans, 06 Oct 2008
I am one of the fans of Paul Tomkins books and one of the lucky receiver of the pre-released signed copy.

I just couldnt put it down, and for the LFC fan out there, this book really can give us knowledge of what have been done from scratch before by Shankly and Paisley to bring LFC to the golden era in footballing sense, and what is being done by the latest manager, Rafa, to bring us back to the place we, LFC all around the world belong.

I just hope this book is thicker than it is!

Will this review appear???, 29 Dec 2008

What a Waste, to quote the man himself.Lamenting the passage of time he allowed to snub his one time friend Mr.Taylor. The Partnership they both enjoyed went the way so many do as one takes the other for granted or rifts occur and eventually parts them. Humble beginnings saw them reach for the sky shooting for the top with unerring accuracy.
It's ironic that his short time at Leeds was over shadowed by his predecessor, Revie. Clough felt his omnipresence like a resident ghost but this would also be the legacy he left at Forest. I also feel that what Clough despised in Revie was a reflection of his own failings. Clough accused Revie of cheating with bribery of referees but when you read about a suitcase full of money..around £15,000 then their traits were quite similar.
A compulsive read which Hamilton has more than done justice to.

Genius, 09 Oct 2008
This book is fantastic. Not a biography, not exactly a memoir, but instead a series of reflections of twenty years spent with Ol Big Ead himself. Clough was a one off - brilliant, impossible, bonkers, infuriating, despicable, loveable, untameable. He took a nothing provincial club and went and won the European Cup. Twice. Unbelieveable.

And this book does the man justice. Crucially, it also does Peter Taylor justice; describing their symbiotic partnership. It also brings back a real nostalgia for the times when footballers weren't pampered prima donnas earning £150k a week. They liked a pint, and a fag, when apprentices had to clean the pros boots, and the game was simpler, less bloated. And when there was room for real characters. And this is a loving but seemingly honest portrait of the biggest character of them all. Demands to be read alongside "The Damned United".

The best of the Clough books, 11 Sep 2008
Just when you thought everything that could be written about Brian Clough had been written, along comes Duncan Hamilton and trumps the lot of them. There are very few, if any, people that stayed with Clough throughout his time at Forest, and no one had the access to Cloughie that Hamilton enjoyed.

To say the book is about Clough, however, is a bit misleading. It's more about his relationship with Hamilton, and how he plays the father figure to the young Nottingham Evening Post journalist. One review criticises the book for going into Clough's more unsavoury characteristics - the drink, the bullying, the whole treatment of Peter Taylor - but I applaud Hamilton for this. In revealing Clough's flaws, you see the vulnerability of the man, making him more human and endearing in the process, rather than the quote machine that others writers have presented him as. Hamilton never pretends to know what Clough was thinking - as David Peace did in the inferior, over-rated Damned United - and indeed Clough's unpredictability is a central theme to the book. Hamilton simply presents the facts as he saw them.

There will never be another Brian Clough, more's the pity, but Duncan Hamilton has provided us with a fitting testament to the man's career. The book is as good as sports writing gets, and it was fully deserving of its William Hill Sports Book of the Year award. Cloughie's character and legend are so strong that there will be dozens of books written about him in the years to come, but none will come close to this fine work.

A Big Story..., 16 Jul 2008
Excellent, straightforward sports biography, distinguished by Hamilton's closeness to his subject and the resulting intimacy of the portrait. No tricks, no fiction or imagined scenes, just sensitive writing and informed analysis of the Clough career and of a very different time in British football - a big enough story in its own right to require very little embroidery.

Duncan Hamilton makes no bones about how fortunate he was to be allowed unparalleled access to the force of nature that was Brian Clough. The portrait that emerges seems to come from something for which 'love' is maybe the only appropriate word; it's to Hamilton's credit that it never seems like obsession as, throughout, he is remarkably clear-eyed about Clough's weaknesses as well as his astonishing triumphs. The excellent and detailed accounts of how Clough took not one but two poor-to-middling English clubs to the heights of European glory (a feat that one struggles to imagine being repeated today) are balanced by an understanding of his very human insecurities and frailties, and by an increasingly dominant subtext - a (literally) sobering account of how low even a character as powerful as Clough could be laid by alcohol.


His favourite word was`s*ithouse`!, 09 Jul 2008
This is one of the most enjoyable books I have ever read. I am old enough to remember Clough at his managerial peak in the seventies. What he managed to achieve at two relatively small clubs will never be repeated. Also, I had often wondered why he and his friend/assistant Peter Taylor fell out and Duncan Hamilton explains the whole sorry tale. Do yourself a favour and buy this book.

Just can not put it down, 15 Dec 2008
Excellent research into the last 50 years of LFC, brilliant analysis into the players and managers. Paul is a brilliant writer...an optimist and a realist all rolled into one.


John Furness loved Dynasty, 09 Nov 2008
An absolutely outstanding read, and the best attempt I've ever found (by a long chalk) to bring some science to the evaluation of team performance / achievement, individual player contribution and managerial capability. It generated some fascinating findings and interesting discussion points. The anecdotes were excellent too, and even for an avid fan like me of over 40 years standing there was information I hadn't been aware of and stories I hadn't heard. Congratulations on an amazing piece of work, that should be made compulsory reading for lazy journalists and TV pundits so that they might base their opinions on facts. John Furness

Essential Reading, 22 Oct 2008
Given the volume of material available on the unique history of Liverpool Football Club, it was difficult to imagine that a book celebrating 50 years of `Shankly's Liverpool' could offer such a fresh view of the goings-on at the club throughout that period. This idea of the book is not simply to discuss the many, many events that helped shape the `Dynasty', but to focus on the main people involved, and how each of them have contributed in their own way, to compare and contrast the reigns of each of the eight men in charge, but also to compare and contrast the strengths and weaknesses of the rivals at each time and put the successes and failures into their historical context.

Each of the managers are analyzed in an extremely comprehensive manner in several different categories, including the strength of the team they inherited, their record in the transfer market, their record on the pitch and, ultimately, their legacy. In order to help contrast the transfer records of the managers, he uses what I found to be a superbly detailed scoring system which helps to rank the best and the worst of each manager. Also on offer here is key information relating to spending power of the club as well as that of their rivals during each reign which leaves the reader with no doubt as to the difficulties facing each manager, without ever stopping to use the greater financial power of other clubs as an excuse for relative failure.

Another key point of the book is that none of the men under discussion are ever glamorized. While the strengths are discussed, so too are the weaknesses, none of which slip under the radar in a bid to compare one manager favourably against another. Despite the large quantity of data and statistics on offer in this book, it's main strength is in the narrative. Never does the reader feel weighed down by the data coming their way, rather, the facts and figures come in a manner that is extremely easy to follow and at times utterly fascinating. The structure of the book leads to a very comfortable read that I would recommend to anyone with even a passing interest in football.


Dynasty - a brilliant read, 16 Oct 2008
I've got all of Paul Tomkins' book and I have to say this is my favourite by far. Where previous books like Golden Past, Red Future and Red Revival used specific seasons as the background topic, Dynasty uses a few decades from the start of the Shankly era to the present day. I make a living working in statistics and whilst this book uses stats as evidence behind every point I particularly enjoyed this book purely as a review of the last 40 odd years in Liverpool history. Well written and nothing like as annoyingly partisan as a lot of books written by Liverpool fans this is a great read, one that I'd highly recommend

Superb Stuff for LFC die hard fans, 06 Oct 2008
I am one of the fans of Paul Tomkins books and one of the lucky receiver of the pre-released signed copy.

I just couldnt put it down, and for the LFC fan out there, this book really can give us knowledge of what have been done from scratch before by Shankly and Paisley to bring LFC to the golden era in footballing sense, and what is being done by the latest manager, Rafa, to bring us back to the place we, LFC all around the world belong.

I just hope this book is thicker than it is!

Legendary goalscorer, mediocre book, 04 Oct 2008
This book suffers from being badly written, which is a shame because Ian Rush was a hero to me when I was growing up. I was looking forward to this book and to be fair the first few chapters were reasonably entertaining, but before long it became the cliched football autobiography and there are long sections explaining the fine details of certain games. As a Liverpool fan, I am aware of these games and I can watch them on DVD if need be; there is nothing more boring than a running commentary of runs, dribbles and passes. Maybe it's because Rushy was naturally a quiet person that there doesn't seem to be too many really interesting anecdotes in this book, however his revelations about not originally warming to Kenny Dalglish and his opinions of his team mates at Juventus are quite interesting. One more thing, the chronology of some of the events are a bit perplexing at times (obviously the proof reading was a bit lax), one passage that springs to mind has Rushy being in Australia playing for Sydney Olympic and getting a call from Rick Parry asking if he'd like to help Rafa with the coaching. Given that Rushy was in Australia until 2000 and Rafa didn't come to Liverpool until 2004....

Bad editing aside, it's still an average read I'm afraid, but thanks Rushy for your 346 goals and lots more besides, you're still and always will be a Legend!


Disappointing, 16 Sep 2008
This should have been good, actually it should have been better than good, when you think of the games and times that Ian Rush played in for Liverpool. Lets not beat around the bush Ian Rush is the greatest striker Liverpool have ever known who played in some of the great teams and great games of his time. Unfortunately this book does not measure up to the career of the player

More than anything I think he has been let down by the people who worked on the book with him. I lost count of the number of grammatical errors, misspelt words and in some cases names of players (Stevie NicHol????, Neil Macdonald in the 86 Cup Final Liverpool team (didn't he play for Everton, as opposed to Kevin Macdonald). Also according to this book Robbie Fowler made his name by scoring 5 against Ipswich rather than Fulham in the League cup.

Now spelling and historical facts aren't everything, but the other main disappointment was the lack of detail (Hillsborough, relationships with other players/managers etc.). Perhaps Hillsborough is too painful and has been covered by others but I thought he may have gone a little deeper with regards to how it affected him personally

Overall Ian comes across as a thoroughly nice guy, very level headed and perhaps too nice to write a book which reveals anything much that isn't already known.

The Player, The Legend, The man, all in one gripping story, 24 Aug 2008
This is one of the best bio`s that you will ever read, not only because it is written by a true football legend, but also because of the honesty within. Some of the recent bios (Rooney for example) are rubbish and skate around issues, never really telling the honest truth. Rush bares all in this bio, the fun, the laughter and the tears. The only surprise is why it has taken him so long to write his memoirs.In 2006, Liverpool fans voted Ian Rush among the top three all-time greatest players in the history of the club. Taking his place alongside Kenny Dalglish and Steven Gerrard, he surpassed legends such as Fowler, Keegan, Owen, Smith, Carragher and Hansen, which speaks volumes of the passion for the man, and the high esteem that Liverpool fans, and football fans alike hold him in.
Ian Rush is quite simply Liverpool's greatest goalscorer and, along with Jimmy Greaves and Denis Law, one of the finest natural penalty-box predators the game has ever seen. We can only hope that Keene and Kuyt, Babel and Torres can stand in his very substancial shadow!!
Thee story tells of the rough-edged Welsh teenager who was thrust into the ranks of an already great side, but who didn't feel he belonged in their company. It tells how he learned to keep his head down and grow as a player, turning into the man that became the most devastating finisher in English football.Rush's story is bursting with honesty and insight, emotional turmoil and tragedy, and hilarious tales and asides. It is a near-mythical tale of triumph and tragedy. Of an era when Liverpool became nigh on invincible, made the League title their own, and rode the highs of European and FA Cup Finals alongside the devastating tragedies of Heysel and Hillsborough.
Such stories are the stuff of dreams and nightmares for every football fan, the drama of Rush's time at Liverpool during the 80s - the decade that defined the club more than any other - is thrillingly captured in this autobiography, which takes you into the thick of the action, as well as offering a frank and insightful analysis of the game today. There have been some good reads from Liverpool authors recently, `We go gathering cups in may`, `43 Years with the same Bird` by Brian Reede is excellent, the `Soft Target` thrillers by Conrad Jones (set at Anfield), `Gangs of Liverpool` parts one and two are all well worth a read.
Rush is a ten out of ten.

Chelsea 2009 Official Annual

Will this review appear???, 29 Dec 2008

What a Waste, to quote the man himself.Lamenting the passage of time he allowed to snub his one time friend Mr.Taylor. The Partnership they both enjoyed went the way so many do as one takes the other for granted or rifts occur and eventually parts them. Humble beginnings saw them reach for the sky shooting for the top with unerring accuracy.
It's ironic that his short time at Leeds was over shadowed by his predecessor, Revie. Clough felt his omnipresence like a resident ghost but this would also be the legacy he left at Forest. I also feel that what Clough despised in Revie was a reflection of his own failings. Clough accused Revie of cheating with bribery of referees but when you read about a suitcase full of money..around £15,000 then their traits were quite similar.
A compulsive read which Hamilton has more than done justice to.

Genius, 09 Oct 2008
This book is fantastic. Not a biography, not exactly a memoir, but instead a series of reflections of twenty years spent with Ol Big Ead himself. Clough was a one off - brilliant, impossible, bonkers, infuriating, despicable, loveable, untameable. He took a nothing provincial club and went and won the European Cup. Twice. Unbelieveable.

And this book does the man justice. Crucially, it also does Peter Taylor justice; describing their symbiotic partnership. It also brings back a real nostalgia for the times when footballers weren't pampered prima donnas earning £150k a week. They liked a pint, and a fag, when apprentices had to clean the pros boots, and the game was simpler, less bloated. And when there was room for real characters. And this is a loving but seemingly honest portrait of the biggest character of them all. Demands to be read alongside "The Damned United".

The best of the Clough books, 11 Sep 2008
Just when you thought everything that could be written about Brian Clough had been written, along comes Duncan Hamilton and trumps the lot of them. There are very few, if any, people that stayed with Clough throughout his time at Forest, and no one had the access to Cloughie that Hamilton enjoyed.

To say the book is about Clough, however, is a bit misleading. It's more about his relationship with Hamilton, and how he plays the father figure to the young Nottingham Evening Post journalist. One review criticises the book for going into Clough's more unsavoury characteristics - the drink, the bullying, the whole treatment of Peter Taylor - but I applaud Hamilton for this. In revealing Clough's flaws, you see the vulnerability of the man, making him more human and endearing in the process, rather than the quote machine that others writers have presented him as. Hamilton never pretends to know what Clough was thinking - as David Peace did in the inferior, over-rated Damned United - and indeed Clough's unpredictability is a central theme to the book. Hamilton simply presents the facts as he saw them.

There will never be another Brian Clough, more's the pity, but Duncan Hamilton has provided us with a fitting testament to the man's career. The book is as good as sports writing gets, and it was fully deserving of its William Hill Sports Book of the Year award. Cloughie's character and legend are so strong that there will be dozens of books written about him in the years to come, but none will come close to this fine work.

A Big Story..., 16 Jul 2008
Excellent, straightforward sports biography, distinguished by Hamilton's closeness to his subject and the resulting intimacy of the portrait. No tricks, no fiction or imagined scenes, just sensitive writing and informed analysis of the Clough career and of a very different time in British football - a big enough story in its own right to require very little embroidery.

Duncan Hamilton makes no bones about how fortunate he was to be allowed unparalleled access to the force of nature that was Brian Clough. The portrait that emerges seems to come from something for which 'love' is maybe the only appropriate word; it's to Hamilton's credit that it never seems like obsession as, throughout, he is remarkably clear-eyed about Clough's weaknesses as well as his astonishing triumphs. The excellent and detailed accounts of how Clough took not one but two poor-to-middling English clubs to the heights of European glory (a feat that one struggles to imagine being repeated today) are balanced by an understanding of his very human insecurities and frailties, and by an increasingly dominant subtext - a (literally) sobering account of how low even a character as powerful as Clough could be laid by alcohol.


His favourite word was`s*ithouse`!, 09 Jul 2008
This is one of the most enjoyable books I have ever read. I am old enough to remember Clough at his managerial peak in the seventies. What he managed to achieve at two relatively small clubs will never be repeated. Also, I had often wondered why he and his friend/assistant Peter Taylor fell out and Duncan Hamilton explains the whole sorry tale. Do yourself a favour and buy this book.

Just can not put it down, 15 Dec 2008
Excellent research into the last 50 years of LFC, brilliant analysis into the players and managers. Paul is a brilliant writer...an optimist and a realist all rolled into one.


John Furness loved Dynasty, 09 Nov 2008
An absolutely outstanding read, and the best attempt I've ever found (by a long chalk) to bring some science to the evaluation of team performance / achievement, individual player contribution and managerial capability. It generated some fascinating findings and interesting discussion points. The anecdotes were excellent too, and even for an avid fan like me of over 40 years standing there was information I hadn't been aware of and stories I hadn't heard. Congratulations on an amazing piece of work, that should be made compulsory reading for lazy journalists and TV pundits so that they might base their opinions on facts. John Furness

Essential Reading, 22 Oct 2008
Given the volume of material available on the unique history of Liverpool Football Club, it was difficult to imagine that a book celebrating 50 years of `Shankly's Liverpool' could offer such a fresh view of the goings-on at the club throughout that period. This idea of the book is not simply to discuss the many, many events that helped shape the `Dynasty', but to focus on the main people involved, and how each of them have contributed in their own way, to compare and contrast the reigns of each of the eight men in charge, but also to compare and contrast the strengths and weaknesses of the rivals at each time and put the successes and failures into their historical context.

Each of the managers are analyzed in an extremely comprehensive manner in several different categories, including the strength of the team they inherited, their record in the transfer market, their record on the pitch and, ultimately, their legacy. In order to help contrast the transfer records of the managers, he uses what I found to be a superbly detailed scoring system which helps to rank the best and the worst of each manager. Also on offer here is key information relating to spending power of the club as well as that of their rivals during each reign which leaves the reader with no doubt as to the difficulties facing each manager, without ever stopping to use the greater financial power of other clubs as an excuse for relative failure.

Another key point of the book is that none of the men under discussion are ever glamorized. While the strengths are discussed, so too are the weaknesses, none of which slip under the radar in a bid to compare one manager favourably against another. Despite the large quantity of data and statistics on offer in this book, it's main strength is in the narrative. Never does the reader feel weighed down by the data coming their way, rather, the facts and figures come in a manner that is extremely easy to follow and at times utterly fascinating. The structure of the book leads to a very comfortable read that I would recommend to anyone with even a passing interest in football.


Dynasty - a brilliant read, 16 Oct 2008
I've got all of Paul Tomkins' book and I have to say this is my favourite by far. Where previous books like Golden Past, Red Future and Red Revival used specific seasons as the background topic, Dynasty uses a few decades from the start of the Shankly era to the present day. I make a living working in statistics and whilst this book uses stats as evidence behind every point I particularly enjoyed this book purely as a review of the last 40 odd years in Liverpool history. Well written and nothing like as annoyingly partisan as a lot of books written by Liverpool fans this is a great read, one that I'd highly recommend

Superb Stuff for LFC die hard fans, 06 Oct 2008
I am one of the fans of Paul Tomkins books and one of the lucky receiver of the pre-released signed copy.

I just couldnt put it down, and for the LFC fan out there, this book really can give us knowledge of what have been done from scratch before by Shankly and Paisley to bring LFC to the golden era in footballing sense, and what is being done by the latest manager, Rafa, to bring us back to the place we, LFC all around the world belong.

I just hope this book is thicker than it is!

Legendary goalscorer, mediocre book, 04 Oct 2008
This book suffers from being badly written, which is a shame because Ian Rush was a hero to me when I was growing up. I was looking forward to this book and to be fair the first few chapters were reasonably entertaining, but before long it became the cliched football autobiography and there are long sections explaining the fine details of certain games. As a Liverpool fan, I am aware of these games and I can watch them on DVD if need be; there is nothing more boring than a running commentary of runs, dribbles and passes. Maybe it's because Rushy was naturally a quiet person that there doesn't seem to be too many really interesting anecdotes in this book, however his revelations about not originally warming to Kenny Dalglish and his opinions of his team mates at Juventus are quite interesting. One more thing, the chronology of some of the events are a bit perplexing at times (obviously the proof reading was a bit lax), one passage that springs to mind has Rushy being in Australia playing for Sydney Olympic and getting a call from Rick Parry asking if he'd like to help Rafa with the coaching. Given that Rushy was in Australia until 2000 and Rafa didn't come to Liverpool until 2004....

Bad editing aside, it's still an average read I'm afraid, but thanks Rushy for your 346 goals and lots more besides, you're still and always will be a Legend!


Disappointing, 16 Sep 2008
This should have been good, actually it should have been better than good, when you think of the games and times that Ian Rush played in for Liverpool. Lets not beat around the bush Ian Rush is the greatest striker Liverpool have ever known who played in some of the great teams and great games of his time. Unfortunately this book does not measure up to the career of the player

More than anything I think he has been let down by the people who worked on the book with him. I lost count of the number of grammatical errors, misspelt words and in some cases names of players (Stevie NicHol????, Neil Macdonald in the 86 Cup Final Liverpool team (didn't he play for Everton, as opposed to Kevin Macdonald). Also according to this book Robbie Fowler made his name by scoring 5 against Ipswich rather than Fulham in the League cup.

Now spelling and historical facts aren't everything, but the other main disappointment was the lack of detail (Hillsborough, relationships with other players/managers etc.). Perhaps Hillsborough is too painful and has been covered by others but I thought he may have gone a little deeper with regards to how it affected him personally

Overall Ian comes across as a thoroughly nice guy, very level headed and perhaps too nice to write a book which reveals anything much that isn't already known.

The Player, The Legend, The man, all in one gripping story, 24 Aug 2008
This is one of the best bio`s that you will ever read, not only because it is written by a true football legend, but also because of the honesty within. Some of the recent bios (Rooney for example) are rubbish and skate around issues, never really telling the honest truth. Rush bares all in this bio, the fun, the laughter and the tears. The only surprise is why it has taken him so long to write his memoirs.In 2006, Liverpool fans voted Ian Rush among the top three all-time greatest players in the history of the club. Taking his place alongside Kenny Dalglish and Steven Gerrard, he surpassed legends such as Fowler, Keegan, Owen, Smith, Carragher and Hansen, which speaks volumes of the passion for the man, and the high esteem that Liverpool fans, and football fans alike hold him in.
Ian Rush is quite simply Liverpool's greatest goalscorer and, along with Jimmy Greaves and Denis Law, one of the finest natural penalty-box predators the game has ever seen. We can only hope that Keene and Kuyt, Babel and Torres can stand in his very substancial shadow!!
Thee story tells of the rough-edged Welsh teenager who was thrust into the ranks of an already great side, but who didn't feel he belonged in their company. It tells how he learned to keep his head down and grow as a player, turning into the man that became the most devastating finisher in English football.Rush's story is bursting with honesty and insight, emotional turmoil and tragedy, and hilarious tales and asides. It is a near-mythical tale of triumph and tragedy. Of an era when Liverpool became nigh on invincible, made the League title their own, and rode the highs of European and FA Cup Finals alongside the devastating tragedies of Heysel and Hillsborough.
Such stories are the stuff of dreams and nightmares for every football fan, the drama of Rush's time at Liverpool during the 80s - the decade that defined the club more than any other - is thrillingly captured in this autobiography, which takes you into the thick of the action, as well as offering a frank and insightful analysis of the game today. There have been some good reads from Liverpool authors recently, `We go gathering cups in may`, `43 Years with the same Bird` by Brian Reede is excellent, the `Soft Target` thrillers by Conrad Jones (set at Anfield), `Gangs of Liverpool` parts one and two are all well worth a read.
Rush is a ten out of ten.


brilliant, 09 Dec 2008
I highly recommend this book to anyone even slightly interested in football. It gives a great insight into the childhood of a football genius. The book is written from the heart and gives an honest account of stevie's life and upbringing. It is written in such a way that it is hard to put the book down. It was great to see my fourteen year old (not usually a big reader) enthusiastic to read. He finished it really quickly. As an adult and a real football enthusiast, I really enjoyed an insight into the game from Stevies view point. Its a book I will keep and read again from time to time. I highly recommend it for both adults and young teenagers!!

Brilliant , 28 Oct 2008
Brilliant read from the start especially for any Liverpool/Gerrard fans, really good read and is quite addicting as he relives hes journey from Ironside to istanbul and how he broke through the liverpool ranks and pushed into the england squad

Definite Purchase

Gerrard: My Autobiography, 15 Aug 2008
As far as autobiographies of young people go this one is not too bad.

One thing that does spoil it is the bad language, it was not neccessary in such volume.

It was a typical autobiography of a footballer If only this, I did that, but it was a good read.

A cracking read., 01 Aug 2008
While most autobiographies are dull and faceless you can't accuse this one of anything. It's such an engaging and entertaining book that you'll be through it in no time and will want to read it again. Being a Liverpool fan, and of course a fan of Stevie G, I was hopng this would be a good one. You never hear anything about him in the press apart from his footballing and he keeps himself to himself but here he opens up and what you get feels genuine and from the heart.

While there is a bit of 'date and event' feel now and again, this is almost all how Gerrard sees things and that can only be a good thing in a biog. This is as close to warts n' all that I've come across in a book for a long time and you get the good times, the bad times and the times that he or his team struggled but came through, and his thoughts and feeling on everything he mentions. There's also a fair bit about his family, but it's not invasive and so you don't feel uncomfortable at any time. It really is that good a book and as a result it's highly recommended. Be warned: there is a fair bit of swearing but take it with a pinch of salt and you'll enjoy it.

Inspirational, 13 Jun 2008
I bought this for my liverpool/footy mad son, he loved it so he lent it to every other liverpool fan he knows, even I ended up reading it.
It is a really good, interesting read. It show's how his commitment from a youngster has influenced his life.
It's written like Steven speaks so in my head he could have been narrating the book.

Will this review appear???, 29 Dec 2008

What a Waste, to quote the man himself.Lamenting the passage of time he allowed to snub his one time friend Mr.Taylor. The Partnership they both enjoyed went the way so many do as one takes the other for granted or rifts occur and eventually parts them. Humble beginnings saw them reach for the sky shooting for the top with unerring accuracy.
It's ironic that his short time at Leeds was over shadowed by his predecessor, Revie. Clough felt his omnipresence like a resident ghost but this would also be the legacy he left at Forest. I also feel that what Clough despised in Revie was a reflection of his own failings. Clough accused Revie of cheating with bribery of referees but when you read about a suitcase full of money..around £15,000 then their traits were quite similar.
A compulsive read which Hamilton has more than done justice to.

Genius, 09 Oct 2008
This book is fantastic. Not a biography, not exactly a memoir, but instead a series of reflections of twenty years spent with Ol Big Ead himself. Clough was a one off - brilliant, impossible, bonkers, infuriating, despicable, loveable, untameable. He took a nothing provincial club and went and won the European Cup. Twice. Unbelieveable.

And this book does the man justice. Crucially, it also does Peter Taylor justice; describing their symbiotic partnership. It also brings back a real nostalgia for the times when footballers weren't pampered prima donnas earning £150k a week. They liked a pint, and a fag, when apprentices had to clean the pros boots, and the game was simpler, less bloated. And when there was room for real characters. And this is a loving but seemingly honest portrait of the biggest character of them all. Demands to be read alongside "The Damned United".

The best of the Clough books, 11 Sep 2008
Just when you thought everything that could be written about Brian Clough had been written, along comes Duncan Hamilton and trumps the lot of them. There are very few, if any, people that stayed with Clough throughout his time at Forest, and no one had the access to Cloughie that Hamilton enjoyed.

To say the book is about Clough, however, is a bit misleading. It's more about his relationship with Hamilton, and how he plays the father figure to the young Nottingham Evening Post journalist. One review criticises the book for going into Clough's more unsavoury characteristics - the drink, the bullying, the whole treatment of Peter Taylor - but I applaud Hamilton for this. In revealing Clough's flaws, you see the vulnerability of the man, making him more human and endearing in the process, rather than the quote machine that others writers have presented him as. Hamilton never pretends to know what Clough was thinking - as David Peace did in the inferior, over-rated Damned United - and indeed Clough's unpredictability is a central theme to the book. Hamilton simply presents the facts as he saw them.

There will never be another Brian Clough, more's the pity, but Duncan Hamilton has provided us with a fitting testament to the man's career. The book is as good as sports writing gets, and it was fully deserving of its William Hill Sports Book of the Year award. Cloughie's character and legend are so strong that there will be dozens of books written about him in the years to come, but none will come close to this fine work.

A Big Story..., 16 Jul 2008
Excellent, straightforward sports biography, distinguished by Hamilton's closeness to his subject and the resulting intimacy of the portrait. No tricks, no fiction or imagined scenes, just sensitive writing and informed analysis of the Clough career and of a very different time in British football - a big enough story in its own right to require very little embroidery.

Duncan Hamilton makes no bones about how fortunate he was to be allowed unparalleled access to the force of nature that was Brian Clough. The portrait that emerges seems to come from something for which 'love' is maybe the only appropriate word; it's to Hamilton's credit that it never seems like obsession as, throughout, he is remarkably clear-eyed about Clough's weaknesses as well as his astonishing triumphs. The excellent and detailed accounts of how Clough took not one but two poor-to-middling English clubs to the heights of European glory (a feat that one struggles to imagine being repeated today) are balanced by an understanding of his very human insecurities and frailties, and by an increasingly dominant subtext - a (literally) sobering account of how low even a character as powerful as Clough could be laid by alcohol.


His favourite word was`s*ithouse`!, 09 Jul 2008
This is one of the most enjoyable books I have ever read. I am old enough to remember Clough at his managerial peak in the seventies. What he managed to achieve at two relatively small clubs will never be repeated. Also, I had often wondered why he and his friend/assistant Peter Taylor fell out and Duncan Hamilton explains the whole sorry tale. Do yourself a favour and buy this book.

Just can not put it down, 15 Dec 2008
Excellent research into the last 50 years of LFC, brilliant analysis into the players and managers. Paul is a brilliant writer...an optimist and a realist all rolled into one.


John Furness loved Dynasty, 09 Nov 2008
An absolutely outstanding read, and the best attempt I've ever found (by a long chalk) to bring some science to the evaluation of team performance / achievement, individual player contribution and managerial capability. It generated some fascinating findings and interesting discussion points. The anecdotes were excellent too, and even for an avid fan like me of over 40 years standing there was information I hadn't been aware of and stories I hadn't heard. Congratulations on an amazing piece of work, that should be made compulsory reading for lazy journalists and TV pundits so that they might base their opinions on facts. John Furness

Essential Reading, 22 Oct 2008
Given the volume of material available on the unique history of Liverpool Football Club, it was difficult to imagine that a book celebrating 50 years of `Shankly's Liverpool' could offer such a fresh view of the goings-on at the club throughout that period. This idea of the book is not simply to discuss the many, many events that helped shape the `Dynasty', but to focus on the main people involved, and how each of them have contributed in their own way, to compare and contrast the reigns of each of the eight men in charge, but also to compare and contrast the strengths and weaknesses of the rivals at each time and put the successes and failures into their historical context.

Each of the managers are analyzed in an extremely comprehensive manner in several different categories, including the strength of the team they inherited, their record in the transfer market, their record on the pitch and, ultimately, their legacy. In order to help contrast the transfer records of the managers, he uses what I found to be a superbly detailed scoring system which helps to rank the best and the worst of each manager. Also on offer here is key information relating to spending power of the club as well as that of their rivals during each reign which leaves the reader with no doubt as to the difficulties facing each manager, without ever stopping to use the greater financial power of other clubs as an excuse for relative failure.

Another key point of the book is that none of the men under discussion are ever glamorized. While the strengths are discussed, so too are the weaknesses, none of which slip under the radar in a bid to compare one manager favourably against another. Despite the large quantity of data and statistics on offer in this book, it's main strength is in the narrative. Never does the reader feel weighed down by the data coming their way, rather, the facts and figures come in a manner that is extremely easy to follow and at times utterly fascinating. The structure of the book leads to a very comfortable read that I would recommend to anyone with even a passing interest in football.


Dynasty - a brilliant read, 16 Oct 2008
I've got all of Paul Tomkins' book and I have to say this is my favourite by far. Where previous books like Golden Past, Red Future and Red Revival used specific seasons as the background topic, Dynasty uses a few decades from the start of the Shankly era to the present day. I make a living working in statistics and whilst this book uses stats as evidence behind every point I particularly enjoyed this book purely as a review of the last 40 odd years in Liverpool history. Well written and nothing like as annoyingly partisan as a lot of books written by Liverpool fans this is a great read, one that I'd highly recommend

Superb Stuff for LFC die hard fans, 06 Oct 2008
I am one of the fans of Paul Tomkins books and one of the lucky receiver of the pre-released signed copy.

I just couldnt put it down, and for the LFC fan out there, this book really can give us knowledge of what have been done from scratch before by Shankly and Paisley to bring LFC to the golden era in footballing sense, and what is being done by the latest manager, Rafa, to bring us back to the place we, LFC all around the world belong.

I just hope this book is thicker than it is!

Legendary goalscorer, mediocre book, 04 Oct 2008
This book suffers from being badly written, which is a shame because Ian Rush was a hero to me when I was growing up. I was looking forward to this book and to be fair the first few chapters were reasonably entertaining, but before long it became the cliched football autobiography and there are long sections explaining the fine details of certain games. As a Liverpool fan, I am aware of these games and I can watch them on DVD if need be; there is nothing more boring than a running commentary of runs, dribbles and passes. Maybe it's because Rushy was naturally a quiet person that there doesn't seem to be too many really interesting anecdotes in this book, however his revelations about not originally warming to Kenny Dalglish and his opinions of his team mates at Juventus are quite interesting. One more thing, the chronology of some of the events are a bit perplexing at times (obviously the proof reading was a bit lax), one passage that springs to mind has Rushy being in Australia playing for Sydney Olympic and getting a call from Rick Parry asking if he'd like to help Rafa with the coaching. Given that Rushy was in Australia until 2000 and Rafa didn't come to Liverpool until 2004....

Bad editing aside, it's still an average read I'm afraid, but thanks Rushy for your 346 goals and lots more besides, you're still and always will be a Legend!


Disappointing, 16 Sep 2008
This should have been good, actually it should have been better than good, when you think of the games and times that Ian Rush played in for Liverpool. Lets not beat around the bush Ian Rush is the greatest striker Liverpool have ever known who played in some of the great teams and great games of his time. Unfortunately this book does not measure up to the career of the player

More than anything I think he has been let down by the people who worked on the book with him. I lost count of the number of grammatical errors, misspelt words and in some cases names of players (Stevie NicHol????, Neil Macdonald in the 86 Cup Final Liverpool team (didn't he play for Everton, as opposed to Kevin Macdonald). Also according to this book Robbie Fowler made his name by scoring 5 against Ipswich rather than Fulham in the League cup.

Now spelling and historical facts aren't everything, but the other main disappointment was the lack of detail (Hillsborough, relationships with other players/managers etc.). Perhaps Hillsborough is too painful and has been covered by others but I thought he may have gone a little deeper with regards to how it affected him personally

Overall Ian comes across as a thoroughly nice guy, very level headed and perhaps too nice to write a book which reveals anything much that isn't already known.

The Player, The Legend, The man, all in one gripping story, 24 Aug 2008
This is one of the best bio`s that you will ever read, not only because it is written by a true football legend, but also because of the honesty within. Some of the recent bios (Rooney for example) are rubbish and skate around issues, never really telling the honest truth. Rush bares all in this bio, the fun, the laughter and the tears. The only surprise is why it has taken him so long to write his memoirs.In 2006, Liverpool fans voted Ian Rush among the top three all-time greatest players in the history of the club. Taking his place alongside Kenny Dalglish and Steven Gerrard, he surpassed legends such as Fowler, Keegan, Owen, Smith, Carragher and Hansen, which speaks volumes of the passion for the man, and the high esteem that Liverpool fans, and football fans alike hold him in.
Ian Rush is quite simply Liverpool's greatest goalscorer and, along with Jimmy Greaves and Denis Law, one of the finest natural penalty-box predators the game has ever seen. We can only hope that Keene and Kuyt, Babel and Torres can stand in his very substancial shadow!!
Thee story tells of the rough-edged Welsh teenager who was thrust into the ranks of an already great side, but who didn't feel he belonged in their company. It tells how he learned to keep his head down and grow as a player, turning into the man that became the most devastating finisher in English football.Rush's story is bursting with honesty and insight, emotional turmoil and tragedy, and hilarious tales and asides. It is a near-mythical tale of triumph and tragedy. Of an era when Liverpool became nigh on invincible, made the League title their own, and rode the highs of European and FA Cup Finals alongside the devastating tragedies of Heysel and Hillsborough.
Such stories are the stuff of dreams and nightmares for every football fan, the drama of Rush's time at Liverpool during the 80s - the decade that defined the club more than any other - is thrillingly captured in this autobiography, which takes you into the thick of the action, as well as offering a frank and insightful analysis of the game today. There have been some good reads from Liverpool authors recently, `We go gathering cups in may`, `43 Years with the same Bird` by Brian Reede is excellent, the `Soft Target` thrillers by Conrad Jones (set at Anfield), `Gangs of Liverpool` parts one and two are all well worth a read.
Rush is a ten out of ten.


brilliant, 09 Dec 2008
I highly recommend this book to anyone even slightly interested in football. It gives a great insight into the childhood of a football genius. The book is written from the heart and gives an honest account of stevie's life and upbringing. It is written in such a way that it is hard to put the book down. It was great to see my fourteen year old (not usually a big reader) enthusiastic to read. He finished it really quickly. As an adult and a real football enthusiast, I really enjoyed an insight into the game from Stevies view point. Its a book I will keep and read again from time to time. I highly recommend it for both adults and young teenagers!!

Brilliant , 28 Oct 2008
Brilliant read from the start especially for any Liverpool/Gerrard fans, really good read and is quite addicting as he relives hes journey from Ironside to istanbul and how he broke through the liverpool ranks and pushed into the england squad

Definite Purchase

Gerrard: My Autobiography, 15 Aug 2008
As far as autobiographies of young people go this one is not too bad.

One thing that does spoil it is the bad language, it was not neccessary in such volume.

It was a typical autobiography of a footballer If only this, I did that, but it was a good read.

A cracking read., 01 Aug 2008
While most autobiographies are dull and faceless you can't accuse this one of anything. It's such an engaging and entertaining book that you'll be through it in no time and will want to read it again. Being a Liverpool fan, and of course a fan of Stevie G, I was hopng this would be a good one. You never hear anything about him in the press apart from his footballing and he keeps himself to himself but here he opens up and what you get feels genuine and from the heart.

While there is a bit of 'date and event' feel now and again, this is almost all how Gerrard sees things and that can only be a good thing in a biog. This is as close to warts n' all that I've come across in a book for a long time and you get the good times, the bad times and the times that he or his team struggled but came through, and his thoughts and feeling on everything he mentions. There's also a fair bit about his family, but it's not invasive and so you don't feel uncomfortable at any time. It really is that good a book and as a result it's highly recommended. Be warned: there is a fair bit of swearing but take it with a pinch of salt and you'll enjoy it.

Inspirational, 13 Jun 2008
I bought this for my liverpool/footy mad son, he loved it so he lent it to every other liverpool fan he knows, even I ended up reading it.
It is a really good, interesting read. It show's how his commitment from a youngster has influenced his life.
It's written like Steven speaks so in my head he could have been narrating the book.

Great look at a great era, 17 Dec 2008
This is a great look at a great Spurs era. Perhaps it doesn't compare to the early 60's but it is more alive for most of us because we can remember it.
The authors got access to the key people and they speak in a very honest and open fashion, to the extent it provides real insights. And its fun too because essentially its about a team who really were a team and enjoyed the whole experience together.

Will this review appear???, 29 Dec 2008

What a Waste, to quote the man himself.Lamenting the passage of time he allowed to snub his one time friend Mr.Taylor. The Partnership they both enjoyed went the way so many do as one takes the other for granted or rifts occur and eventually parts them. Humble beginnings saw them reach for the sky shooting for the top with unerring accuracy.
It's ironic that his short time at Leeds was over shadowed by his predecessor, Revie. Clough felt his omnipresence like a resident ghost but this would also be the legacy he left at Forest. I also feel that what Clough despised in Revie was a reflection of his own failings. Clough accused Revie of cheating with bribery of referees but when you read about a suitcase full of money..around £15,000 then their traits were quite similar.
A compulsive read which Hamilton has more than done justice to.

Genius, 09 Oct 2008
This book is fantastic. Not a biography, not exactly a memoir, but instead a series of reflections of twenty years spent with Ol Big Ead himself. Clough was a one off - brilliant, impossible, bonkers, infuriating, despicable, loveable, untameable. He took a nothing provincial club and went and won the European Cup. Twice. Unbelieveable.

And this book does the man justice. Crucially, it also does Peter Taylor justice; describing their symbiotic partnership. It also brings back a real nostalgia for the times when footballers weren't pampered prima donnas earning £150k a week. They liked a pint, and a fag, when apprentices had to clean the pros boots, and the game was simpler, less bloated. And when there was room for real characters. And this is a loving but seemingly honest portrait of the biggest character of them all. Demands to be read alongside "The Damned United".

The best of the Clough books, 11 Sep 2008
Just when you thought everything that could be written about Brian Clough had been written, along comes Duncan Hamilton and trumps the lot of them. There are very few, if any, people that stayed with Clough throughout his time at Forest, and no one had the access to Cloughie that Hamilton enjoyed.

To say the book is about Clough, however, is a bit misleading. It's more about his relationship with Hamilton, and how he plays the father figure to the young Nottingham Evening Post journalist. One review criticises the book for going into Clough's more unsavoury characteristics - the drink, the bullying, the whole treatment of Peter Taylor - but I applaud Hamilton for this. In revealing Clough's flaws, you see the vulnerability of the man, making him more human and endearing in the process, rather than the quote machine that others writers have presented him as. Hamilton never pretends to know what Clough was thinking - as David Peace did in the inferior, over-rated Damned United - and indeed Clough's unpredictability is a central theme to the book. Hamilton simply presents the facts as he saw them.

There will never be another Brian Clough, more's the pity, but Duncan Hamilton has provided us with a fitting testament to the man's career. The book is as good as sports writing gets, and it was fully deserving of its William Hill Sports Book of the Year award. Cloughie's character and legend are so strong that there will be dozens of books written about him in the years to come, but none will come close to this fine work.

A Big Story..., 16 Jul 2008
Excellent, straightforward sports biography, distinguished by Hamilton's closeness to his subject and the resulting intimacy of the portrait. No tricks, no fiction or imagined scenes, just sensitive writing and informed analysis of the Clough career and of a very different time in British football - a big enough story in its own right to require very little embroidery.

Duncan Hamilton makes no bones about how fortunate he was to be allowed unparalleled access to the force of nature that was Brian Clough. The portrait that emerges seems to come from something for which 'love' is maybe the only appropriate word; it's to Hamilton's credit that it never seems like obsession as, throughout, he is remarkably clear-eyed about Clough's weaknesses as well as his astonishing triumphs. The excellent and detailed accounts of how Clough took not one but two poor-to-middling English clubs to the heights of European glory (a feat that one struggles to imagine being repeated today) are balanced by an understanding of his very human insecurities and frailties, and by an increasingly dominant subtext - a (literally) sobering account of how low even a character as powerful as Clough could be laid by alcohol.


His favourite word was`s*ithouse`!, 09 Jul 2008
This is one of the most enjoyable books I have ever read. I am old enough to remember Clough at his managerial peak in the seventies. What he managed to achieve at two relatively small clubs will never be repeated. Also, I had often wondered why he and his friend/assistant Peter Taylor fell out and Duncan Hamilton explains the whole sorry tale. Do yourself a favour and buy this book.

Just can not put it down, 15 Dec 2008
Excellent research into the last 50 years of LFC, brilliant analysis into the players and managers. Paul is a brilliant writer...an optimist and a realist all rolled into one.


John Furness loved Dynasty, 09 Nov 2008
An absolutely outstanding read, and the best attempt I've ever found (by a long chalk) to bring some science to the evaluation of team performance / achievement, individual player contribution and managerial capability. It generated some fascinating findings and interesting discussion points. The anecdotes were excellent too, and even for an avid fan like me of over 40 years standing there was information I hadn't been aware of and stories I hadn't heard. Congratulations on an amazing piece of work, that should be made compulsory reading for lazy journalists and TV pundits so that they might base their opinions on facts. John Furness

Essential Reading, 22 Oct 2008
Given the volume of material available on the unique history of Liverpool Football Club, it was difficult to imagine that a book celebrating 50 years of `Shankly's Liverpool' could offer such a fresh view of the goings-on at the club throughout that period. This idea of the book is not simply to discuss the many, many events that helped shape the `Dynasty', but to focus on the main people involved, and how each of them have contributed in their own way, to compare and contrast the reigns of each of the eight men in charge, but also to compare and contrast the strengths and weaknesses of the rivals at each time and put the successes and failures into their historical context.

Each of the managers are analyzed in an extremely comprehensive manner in several different categories, including the strength of the team they inherited, their record in the transfer market, their record on the pitch and, ultimately, their legacy. In order to help contrast the transfer records of the managers, he uses what I found to be a superbly detailed scoring system which helps to rank the best and the worst of each manager. Also on offer here is key information relating to spending power of the club as well as that of their rivals during each reign which leaves the reader with no doubt as to the difficulties facing each manager, without ever stopping to use the greater financial power of other clubs as an excuse for relative failure.

Another key point of the book is that none of the men under discussion are ever glamorized. While the strengths are discussed, so too are the weaknesses, none of which slip under the radar in a bid to compare one manager favourably against another. Despite the large quantity of data and statistics on offer in this book, it's main strength is in the narrative. Never does the reader feel weighed down by the data coming their way, rather, the facts and figures come in a manner that is extremely easy to follow and at times utterly fascinating. The structure of the book leads to a very comfortable read that I would recommend to anyone with even a passing interest in football.


Dynasty - a brilliant read, 16 Oct 2008
I've got all of Paul Tomkins' book and I have to say this is my favourite by far. Where previous books like Golden Past, Red Future and Red Revival used specific seasons as the background topic, Dynasty uses a few decades from the start of the Shankly era to the present day. I make a living working in statistics and whilst this book uses stats as evidence behind every point I particularly enjoyed this book purely as a review of the last 40 odd years in Liverpool history. Well written and nothing like as annoyingly partisan as a lot of books written by Liverpool fans this is a great read, one that I'd highly recommend

Superb Stuff for LFC die hard fans, 06 Oct 2008
I am one of the fans of Paul Tomkins books and one of the lucky receiver of the pre-released signed copy.

I just couldnt put it down, and for the LFC fan out there, this book really can give us knowledge of what have been done from scratch before by Shankly and Paisley to bring LFC to the golden era in footballing sense, and what is being done by the latest manager, Rafa, to bring us back to the place we, LFC all around the world belong.

I just hope this book is thicker than it is!

Legendary goalscorer, mediocre book, 04 Oct 2008
This book suffers from being badly written, which is a shame because Ian Rush was a hero to me when I was growing up. I was looking forward to this book and to be fair the first few chapters were reasonably entertaining, but before long it became the cliched football autobiography and there are long sections explaining the fine details of certain games. As a Liverpool fan, I am aware of these games and I can watch them on DVD if need be; there is nothing more boring than a running commentary of runs, dribbles and passes. Maybe it's because Rushy was naturally a quiet person that there doesn't seem to be too many really interesting anecdotes in this book, however his revelations about not originally warming to Kenny Dalglish and his opinions of his team mates at Juventus are quite interesting. One more thing, the chronology of some of the events are a bit perplexing at times (obviously the proof reading was a bit lax), one passage that springs to mind has Rushy being in Australia playing for Sydney Olympic and getting a call from Rick Parry asking if he'd like to help Rafa with the coaching. Given that Rushy was in Australia until 2000 and Rafa didn't come to Liverpool until 2004....

Bad editing aside, it's still an average read I'm afraid, but thanks Rushy for your 346 goals and lots more besides, you're still and always will be a Legend!


Disappointing, 16 Sep 2008
This should have been good, actually it should have been better than good, when you think of the games and times that Ian Rush played in for Liverpool. Lets not beat around the bush Ian Rush is the greatest striker Liverpool have ever known who played in some of the great teams and great games of his time. Unfortunately this book does not measure up to the career of the player

More than anything I think he has been let down by the people who worked on the book with him. I lost count of the number of grammatical errors, misspelt words and in some cases names of players (Stevie NicHol????, Neil Macdonald in the 86 Cup Final Liverpool team (didn't he play for Everton, as opposed to Kevin Macdonald). Also according to this book Robbie Fowler made his name by scoring 5 against Ipswich rather than Fulham in the League cup.

Now spelling and historical facts aren't everything, but the other main disappointment was the lack of detail (Hillsborough, relationships with other players/managers etc.). Perhaps Hillsborough is too painful and has been covered by others but I thought he may have gone a little deeper with regards to how it affected him personally

Overall Ian comes across as a thoroughly nice guy, very level headed and perhaps too nice to write a book which reveals anything much that isn't already known.

The Player, The Legend, The man, all in one gripping story, 24 Aug 2008
This is one of the best bio`s that you will ever read, not only because it is written by a true football legend, but also because of the honesty within. Some of the recent bios (Rooney for example) are rubbish and skate around issues, never really telling the honest truth. Rush bares all in this bio, the fun, the laughter and the tears. The only surprise is why it has taken him so long to write his memoirs.In 2006, Liverpool fans voted Ian Rush among the top three all-time greatest players in the history of the club. Taking his place alongside Kenny Dalglish and Steven Gerrard, he surpassed legends such as Fowler, Keegan, Owen, Smith, Carragher and Hansen, which speaks volumes of the passion for the man, and the high esteem that Liverpool fans, and football fans alike hold him in.
Ian Rush is quite simply Liverpool's greatest goalscorer and, along with Jimmy Greaves and Denis Law, one of the finest natural penalty-box predators the game has ever seen. We can only hope that Keene and Kuyt, Babel and Torres can stand in his very substancial shadow!!
Thee story tells of the rough-edged Welsh teenager who was thrust into the ranks of an already great side, but who didn't feel he belonged in their company. It tells how he learned to keep his head down and grow as a player, turning into the man that became the most devastating finisher in English football.Rush's story is bursting with honesty and insight, emotional turmoil and tragedy, and hilarious tales and asides. It is a near-mythical tale of triumph and tragedy. Of an era when Liverpool became nigh on invincible, made the League title their own, and rode the highs of European and FA Cup Finals alongside the devastating tragedies of Heysel and Hillsborough.
Such stories are the stuff of dreams and nightmares for every football fan, the drama of Rush's time at Liverpool during the 80s - the decade that defined the club more than any other - is thrillingly captured in this autobiography, which takes you into the thick of the action, as well as offering a frank and insightful analysis of the game today. There have been some good reads from Liverpool authors recently, `We go gathering cups in may`, `43 Years with the same Bird` by Brian Reede is excellent, the `Soft Target` thrillers by Conrad Jones (set at Anfield), `Gangs of Liverpool` parts one and two are all well worth a read.
Rush is a ten out of ten.


brilliant, 09 Dec 2008
I highly recommend this book to anyone even slightly interested in football. It gives a great insight into the childhood of a football genius. The book is written from the heart and gives an honest account of stevie's life and upbringing. It is written in such a way that it is hard to put the book down. It was great to see my fourteen year old (not usually a big reader) enthusiastic to read. He finished it really quickly. As an adult and a real football enthusiast, I really enjoyed an insight into the game from Stevies view point. Its a book I will keep and read again from time to time. I highly recommend it for both adults and young teenagers!!

Brilliant , 28 Oct 2008
Brilliant read from the start especially for any Liverpool/Gerrard fans, really good read and is quite addicting as he relives hes journey from Ironside to istanbul and how he broke through the liverpool ranks and pushed into the england squad

Definite Purchase

Gerrard: My Autobiography, 15 Aug 2008
As far as autobiographies of young people go this one is not too bad.

One thing that does spoil it is the bad language, it was not neccessary in such volume.

It was a typical autobiography of a footballer If only this, I did that, but it was a good read.

A cracking read., 01 Aug 2008
While most autobiographies are dull and faceless you can't accuse this one of anything. It's such an engaging and entertaining book that you'll be through it in no time and will want to read it again. Being a Liverpool fan, and of course a fan of Stevie G, I was hopng this would be a good one. You never hear anything about him in the press apart from his footballing and he keeps himself to himself but here he opens up and what you get feels genuine and from the heart.

While there is a bit of 'date and event' feel now and again, this is almost all how Gerrard sees things and that can only be a good thing in a biog. This is as close to warts n' all that I've come across in a book for a long time and you get the good times, the bad times and the times that he or his team struggled but came through, and his thoughts and feeling on everything he mentions. There's also a fair bit about his family, but it's not invasive and so you don't feel uncomfortable at any time. It really is that good a book and as a result it's highly recommended. Be warned: there is a fair bit of swearing but take it with a pinch of salt and you'll enjoy it.

Inspirational, 13 Jun 2008
I bought this for my liverpool/footy mad son, he loved it so he lent it to every other liverpool fan he knows, even I ended up reading it.
It is a really good, interesting read. It show's how his commitment from a youngster has influenced his life.
It's written like Steven speaks so in my head he could have been narrating the book.

Great look at a great era, 17 Dec 2008
This is a great look at a great Spurs era. Perhaps it doesn't compare to the early 60's but it is more alive for most of us because we can remember it.
The authors got access to the key people and they speak in a very honest and open fashion, to the extent it provides real insights. And its fun too because essentially its about a team who really were a team and enjoyed the whole experience together.

indespensible, 23 Aug 2006
Bought this book for myself, now just ordered another copy for my spurs supporting nephew.

What I really like about this book is how more-ish it is for unusual facts and figures, regarding all things spurs and that it's not just a book that you read once and then forget about to collect dust. I find that I keep on refering to it and picking out new facts and feats about Tottenham's glorious history to annoy my Arsenal supporting work colleagues.

Perfect present material as you're not burdening someone into reading a whole book in one go, but giving them a series of witty passages and trivia about (to quote Ossie) "totteringham".

COYS!