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Posted 722 days ago
PERHAPS, IN 1997, rugby players thought documentaries like this were simply part and parcel of professionalism. What is certain is that all players love watching this classic DVD and that such access – and thus such compelling footage – won’t be seen again, writes Rugby World deputy editor Alan Pearey.
From the moment the squad meet up for team-bonding exercises at…
Posted 722 days ago
THE LATE Clem Thomas and his son Greg produced what most regard as the best Lions history yet published. But proving that you can’t have too much of a good thing, Scottish rugby writers Jeff Connor and Martin Hannan have weighed in with a book of real quality, writes Rugby World deputy editor Alan Pearey.
Based on both the authors’…
Posted 759 days ago
WHEN KENNY Logan decided to publish his autobiography, he wanted a ghostwriter who didn’t know him and so would have no preconceptions. He chose The Observer’s Michael Aylwin and it’s made for a happy marriage, writes Rugby World deputy writer Alan Pearey.
If Logan’s rugby and dyslexia are the threads that run through the book, there are numerous entertaining diversions.…
Posted 768 days ago
The British Sports Book Awards, encompassing the best in British and Irish sports literature over the past 12 months, take place in London on 9 May. Six titles are competing for the rugby gong…
The Grudge – Tom English
Yellow Jersey
£12.99
Tom English’s stunning account of the politically charged tensions surrounding the 1990 Calcutta Cup, when the Scots sent England packing in…
Posted 781 days ago
You always sensed that Scottish rugby was the most true-blue amateur of all, and this weighty book of nearly 500 pages does nothing to disaffirm that view. The authors interview dozens of Scotland players from every post-war decade, and the mild surprise of crazy selections and slowness to develop on-field ‘moves’ gives way to amazement when Peter Brown reveals that…
Posted 781 days ago
NOT MANY people know this but the inaugural World Ubogu Championships took place in a London pub last year. The competition involves saying the word ‘Ubogu’ – as in the former Bath and England prop – as many times as possible in a single breath, and if that sounds a simple concept you’d be surprised at how many tactics come…
Posted 790 days ago
What do you get when you mix one of the world’s leading sports historians with one of the best sports archives bar none? One hell of a read, that’s what. Tony Collins, Professor of Social History at Leeds Metropolitan University, devoted four years to scrutinizing RFU and IRB minutes at Twickenham, then writing this remarkable history of our game. “I…
Posted 790 days ago
The Armchair Zone with Alan Pearey – Deputy Editor
There have been some cracking rugby history books down the years, but never have we been treated to rugby writing by the men who were there at the time. Until now.
This collection of 17 contemporary essays from the 19th century is not consistently interesting – the advice on on-field positions, for example,…
Posted 790 days ago
Even good coaching books can be heavy going for the reader, so how refreshing to discover something packed with sound advice yet as easy to digest as a forkful of rice. Keith Richardson, the former club and national coach who edited the RFU’s Technical Journal from 2001-08, writes as if he were talking to the Gloucester forwards he famously coached.
Thus,…
Posted 791 days ago
In truth, Lansdowne Road’s history is rather more impressive than the dilapidated stadium that was demolished in 2006 to make way for the shiny new Aviva Stadium. Yet when the old ground bowed out in style – with Brian O’Driscoll’s stunning pass to himself, in a Leinster-Ulster game, becoming a YouTube hit – there were many who mourned its…
