New: The Football Men

Title: The Football Men - Up Close with the Giants of the Modern Game
Author: Simon Kuper
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Year: 2011

The Football Men is a collection of essays and articles by British journalist Simon Kuper. Kuper is, in my opinion, one of the finest writers on sport in the world. Kuper’s first book, Football Against The Enemy remains a classic and I would highly recommended his other work, Ajax, The Dutch, The War and Why England Lose (co-authored with Stefan Szymanski. We can now add The Football Men to Kuper’s stellar list of work.

The Football Men is a series of portraits of those at the upper echelon of the game – from Bert Trautman to Dennis Bergkamp to Lionel Messi, managers such as Diego Maradona, Arsene Wenger and Jose Mourinho and others involved in the game such as Franz Beckenbauer. From short articles to very detailed studies it is a readable and stimulating book that examines what exactly makes these people tick and why they find themselves in the positions they are in.

The theme that comes across within the first few pages is that these men are not like us fans that support them – they are careerists and they are almost certainly not as interesting as certain elements of the media would have you believe – Kuper refers to many players not having anything of interest to say at all beyond mundane platitudes.

What is more revealing is when Kuper looks at why certain players and managers act in the way they do. Kuper believes that Jose Mourinho’s attitude is borne out of his family and his wife’s family being one of the big losers in Portugal’s move from dictatorship to democracy. Kuper discovers that Ruud Guillt looked supremely average when playing in a Seniors league, being outplayed by other 40somethings.

The Football Men is at its best when Kuper includes articles where he was provided more than a few column inches. His profiles on Lothar Matthaus, Nicolas Anelka, Glenn Hoddle and Johan Cruyff are particularly revealing – if we could have more of these pieces then football journalism would be in a much better place.

The Football Men is available here