TITLE = Spirit High and Passion Pure AUTHOR = Charlie Connelly PRICE = 13.59 Pounds, EUR 21.13 SIZE = 208 pages YEAR = 2000, Mainstream Publishing SOURCE = www.amazon.co.uk RATING = 3 stars
A decent effort by Connelly, although not as good as some of his other
efforts, such as Stamping Grounds or London Fields
The subtitle of this book is A Journey through European Football,
and has some pretty decent chapters. It is geared towrds a British
audience, but doesn't really lose much in the translation :)
For most of the larger or familiar countries, he focuses on a particular
situation or incident to illustrate the state of the game. For example,
the Spanish chapter is basically Athletic Bilbao. (A minor criticism is
that he readily accepts the "vanguard of Basque nationalism" mantel that
Athletic like to wrap themselves up in. For a more level account, see Phil
Ball's excellent Morbo). The Italian
chapter concentrates on the great Torino team that perished in the the
1949 air disaster. Germany is viewed mostly through the lens of
Unterhaching. That makes it somewhat dated, since the then "scrappy" club
of Bundesliga fame has dropped the "s" and is in the 3rd division, and
possible to drop to the 4th. His desire to latch on to some of the more
obscure clubs is admirable, since it would have been easy to just
concentrate on the big-shots and call it a day. Among the best chapters is
the story of football in the Faroe Islands, lining out how the game has
developed there. He wraps his trip up with a trip to Tromso, Norway to
check out the state of the game in the "northern-most top flight club."
Again, overall a good book, worth reading.