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Bamba's Babes

Leicester City Book

By Bamba's Babes, in Leicester City Forum

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Bamba's Babes

Bamba's Babes

Posted
Posted

I want to buy a book profiling our Premier League winning season.

 

Which is the best book to buy? I've seen a few about such as 5000-1 by Rob Tanner, Fearless, The Immortals etc.

 

What would you suggest?

FoyleFox

FoyleFox

Posted
Posted

I've read Against All Odds, 5000-1, The Immortals, Fearless, King Power. My favourite was Fearless.

I've not yet read Unbelievables or We are Staying Up though. Will be cracking into those next holiday. And We're All Going On A European Tour if Amazon have it by Oct.

Spudulike

Spudulike

Posted
Posted

I've read most and they all have some merits (even the hastily rushed 5000-1). The Immortals is good but the best from a fans perspective is The Unbelievables. However, in my opinion, go for Fearless if you only want to buy one :thumbup:

UpTheLeagueFox

UpTheLeagueFox

Posted
Posted

Well worth buying 5000/1 by Rob Tanner, Fearless by J Northcroft, The Invincibles and the Richard III book (very funny and the guy who wrote it is, apparently, a Spurs fan)

 

Don't bother with the Harry Harris book. It's utter shiiiite.

Chico1958

Chico1958

Posted
Posted

Wait til this season starts then go on the works site

 

You'll find a bargain....... they're all worth a read with a beer, sunbed and MP3   :thumbup:

 

Ps: Don't forget the suntan lotion

Fez of Mahrez

Fez of Mahrez

Posted
Posted

Here are a couple of chapters of The Unbelievables for you to see the kind of thing it is:

 

25: Manchester City (A)
Saturday 6 February 2016

 

‘Lovely Northern weather,’ says Jamie Vardy as he jogs out of the tunnel to warm up in relentless, slow drizzle. Riyad Mahrez juggles a ball with his left foot from the away dressing room onto the sodden turf of the Etihad Stadium. Pressure? What pressure? Leicester City are loving life in the big time.

 

Welcome to the third age of the Premier League.

 

In the beginning, there was Manchester United and they won the league. Every year. Or so it seemed. Sir Alex Ferguson was their manager and they dominated the landscape of English football.

 

Then there were Chelsea and Manchester City. Fuelled by the billions of oil magnates, they spent and spent until they were firmly established alongside United in the new order of the Premier League.

 

Things would never be the same again and supporters of mid-ranking Championship clubs slumped our shoulders as our beloved teams were destined to play out the rest of their days light years away from the pinnacle of the national sport.

 

Until today.

 

This afternoon, one of the oil-rich mega-clubs must lower itself to scrapping for every ball, straining for every header and committing to every tackle just to restore parity with a club that has contributed a drop to the vast ocean of Premier League wealth.

 

Earlier in the week, Manuel Pellegrini announced that he would depart Manchester City in the summer with the Bayern Munich manager Pep Guardiola confirmed as his successor. Outside the ground prior to kick-off, street sellers offer scarves bearing Guardiola's face.

 

Welcome to Manchester – as a certain billboard once read.

 

This is our first game of the season to be billed as a clash between title rivals. Win it and we would be six points clear of Manchester City with thirteen games remaining. Lose and the two teams are level on points. No wonder most fans would be happy to zoom back down the M6 with a point.

 

We know the team these days. The Tinkerman rarely changes it. Schmeichel; Simpson, Morgan, Huth, Fuchs; Mahrez, Drinkwater, Kanté, Albrighton; Vardy, Okazaki.

 

Two wins in a row, in which five goals were scored and none conceded, have given a whole new complexion to Leicester City's season. In a sense, the hard work has been done. City can afford to lose at both the Etihad and the Emirates and still go on to claim the Premier League trophy, but any sort of result at either ground would be a gigantic bonus. The fans are starting to believe. The media are starting to believe. The players appear to have believed all along.

 

Kick off.

 

Our boys are on the front foot straight away. Within the first 60 seconds, N'Golo Kanté has completed a pass, won a header, made an interception and tackled the illustrious Yaya Toure to set his team on an attack that results in a foul on Riyad Mahrez close to the penalty area.

 

Mahrez delivers the free kick from the right and Robert Huth darts in front of his marker, Martin Demichelis, to touch the ball past Joe Hart. The home side have barely touched the ball and it's already in the back of their net. At the other end of the stadium, spread across three tiers as part of a record attendance, we are a blur of limbs.

 

Ranieri's men don't stop there, sitting back as expected but enjoying the better opportunities. With ten minutes gone, Mahrez lopes across the centre circle and sets the overlapping Danny Drinkwater clear on the left but the angle is tight and Hart deflects the ball behind. Halfway through the first half Kanté nicks the ball from Sergio Agüero and gives it to Mahrez. The Algerian's long pass finds Vardy who beats Nicolas Otamendi for pace and his low cross almost results in a goal for Shinji Okazaki.

 

We’re so proud of this team. They’re going for it.

 

Manchester City apply pressure. David Silva pokes a shot wide with the help of a Wes Morgan deflection and referee Anthony Taylor turns down a penalty appeal from Pablo Zabaleta, instead giving a free kick inches outside the box, as the home side probe for a leveller.

 

Indecision in the away end as Taylor blows the half-time whistle. Would you take a draw now? A tricky question. We’re six points clear at the top of the Premier League as it stands, winning at the home of the title favourites. Dare we dream of holding this one-goal lead?

 

Indecision on the pitch too, but only among those in light blue. Again they push forward and again they're caught out by a trademark counter-attack. Albrighton and Kanté combine to outmuscle Zabaleta and Kanté hares off down the left wing.

 

Remember the days when we thought he was just a holding midfielder? Remember the days when we didn't realise we had signed one of the best midfielders in the world for less than Derby County paid for Bradley Johnson?

 

Kanté cuts inside past Fernandinho and plays it forward to Mahrez, who hurdles the challenge of Otamendi. In a matter of seconds, Leicester's two Paris-born superstars have outwitted players who cost eleven times more than them.

 

It’s all about split seconds now. That’s how long it takes us to realise Mahrez is one-on-one with Demichelis. That’s how long it takes Mahrez to throw one foot and then the other into an extravagant step-over and send Demichelis spinning. That’s how long it takes Mahrez’s shot to flash past Joe Hart into the net.

 

It's 2-0. It’s Mahrez's fifteenth goal of a remarkable season. Leicester City are dismantling one of the most expensive football teams ever constructed.

Pellegrini responds by withdrawing his captain Yaya Toure and the England international Fabian Delph, each humbled by the workrate and skill of the uncapped duo Kanté and Drinkwater.

 

On an afternoon of eleven magnificent individual performances, Kasper Schmeichel reminds everyone of his importance to the team by reacting brilliantly to push away a close-range effort from substitute Fernando and the Manchester City players begin to look as though they know it's not their day.

 

It's City's day and, in particular, it's Robert Huth's day. The big German bashes a header past Hart from a pinpoint Christian Fuchs corner to make it 3-0 after an hour and it's game over.

 

Agüero heads a late consolation and a Danny Simpson error almost results in a second Agüero goal. Simpson grins at his error, a clear sign this team is simply enjoying its football. No pressure. Six points clear at the top of the Premier League, but no pressure.

 

The Manchester City fans clap the former Manchester United player Simpson and his team-mates off the pitch at the end of the match and they clap us out of the away end too. Despite all the money and the marketing gloss, this club has known failure and frustration. These fans appreciate effort, commitment and the unfolding of a fairy tale.

 

We stumble from the away end in a daze. Let it sink in. It won’t always be like this.

 

Later on Saturday, Tottenham win 1-0 at home to Watford. On Sunday, Arsenal win 2-0 at Bournemouth. The gap from the leaders to the two north London sides locked together is five points. Manchester City slip to fourth. Fifth-placed Manchester United, now realistically the only side with faint hopes of replacing City in the Champions League places, concede an injury-time goal to draw 1-1 at Stamford Bridge.

 

Claudio Ranieri laughs off the news that his side have been installed as the new favourites to win the Premier League. The odds were 5,000/1 before the season began. Now they are 7/4.

 

Everyone is talking about Leicester City, even England's new rugby union coach Eddie Jones ahead of his side's Six Nations clash with Italy.

‘How are Leicester City top of the Premier League?’ says Jones. ‘It’s all because of attitude and how hard they work for each other. It’s because the sum of that team is greater than the individuals.’

 

Ninety minutes in Manchester changed everything.

 

When Anthony Taylor blew the final whistle at the Etihad Stadium, it only meant three more points - the same as we got for beating Sunderland at home on the opening day or a dishevelled and disinterested Newcastle United at St James's Park in November. However, the nature of the victory, the magnitude of the game, the millions watching worldwide, the confidence of the performance and the lack of precedents meant it only took an hour and a half under a grey northern sky for Leicester City's global profile to go stratospheric.

 

It's tough for footballers, managers, coaches and especially scouts at other clubs. While on the one hand City's success has allowed fans across the country to dream of their side breaking into the elite, it also leaves no hiding place.

 

They ask difficult questions: why isn’t their club signing players like that? Why aren't they able to keep clean sheets and score at will? Why aren't they getting value for money in the transfer market? Most glaringly, if Okazaki and Kanté and Vardy and Albrighton can run themselves into the ground, why can't their players?

 

We don't have to worry about our players failing to put in the hard yards in the final third of the season. The concern is instead that the pressure will get to them and that it will be tough for Jamie Vardy not to tense up when a vital chance falls to him in the dying moments or that an increasingly expectant home crowd will grow nervous when City are unable to break down a relegation-threatened team deep into the second half.

 

There are also mounting comparisons with Diego Simeone's La Liga-winning Atlético Madrid of 2014, a compact, counter-attacking side packed with players who worked for each other. These comparisons could have been made after City's 3-0 wins at Newcastle and Swansea before Christmas when the first signs of a fully-functioning winning machine were apparent. The sense that it would all come crashing down when City came up against ‘the big rocks’ nagged away though and journalists held off until it was no longer possible to ignore what might happen.

 

Maybe it takes a Roman to be truly romantic. None of the column inches written about Leicester City this week can match the poetry of Claudio Ranieri's interview with Corriere della Sera: ‘I always tell my players to find the fire within themselves. A chance like this will never come round again. Seek that fire, don’t be ashamed of it. And they are not ashamed; if anything they demand to dream.’

 

Don't we all?

 

---

 

The Ice Kings

 

Leicester City fans wake up on Christmas morning and check the Premier League table. Yes, it’s still looking as surreal as it did yesterday and the day before that and every week since the season began.

 

Leicester City are top of the Premier League, twelve months after sitting bottom of the table. We are the first team to achieve this feat in the Premier League era and only the second, after Norwich City in 1988, in the history of English football.

 

For a number of weeks, BBC Radio Leicester have been playing the Champions League theme tune to open their Monday night football phone-in. It started out as a bit of a joke but there’s a real chance that it will be heard at the King Power next season. City are nine points clear of fifth place and have lost only one of the first seventeen games.

 

Christmas Day comes and goes. We eat too much, maybe we drink too much, and we talk about the miracle taking place. We wake up the following morning and we can’t wait to see our team again, like thousands of City fans just over fifty years ago.

 

Boxing Day 1962. Leicester City were an established First Division team, having lost in the FA Cup Final to the famous double-winning Tottenham Hotspur side just eighteen months before. In wintry conditions, City beat Leyton Orient 5-1 at Filbert Street. This was one of many defeats for Orient during the course of what remains their only season in the top flight. City, on the other hand, were just getting started.

 

The whole of Britain was paralysed by arctic weather but, as other teams up and down the country postponed their games week after week, Leicester City played on.

 

In those days, John Hutchinson used to pay seven and a half pence to stand on the Popular Side at Filbert Street and peer through gaps in the crowd to see his heroes. He never even expected to see the whole pitch. Now, in his role as the club’s official historian, he knows an awful lot more about it.

 

‘One of the reasons they kept playing was because the groundsman had some chemical mixture he put on the grass,’ says Hutchinson. ‘It kept the pitch warm but it ruined it for years to come. They also had coke braziers they used to light and then remove four hours before kick-off.’

 

It’s a world away from the state-of-the-art playing surface at the King Power Stadium, artificial grass sewn into the soil and maintained by an award-winning team led by head groundsman John Ledwidge.

 

In the winter of 1962/63, the pitch didn’t need to win awards. It just needed to be playable.

 

‘When other teams came, they weren’t used to the surface,’ says Hutchinson. ‘Leicester were a great side anyway, but they also knew how to play on the pitch and it gave them an edge.’

 

That edge resulted in a long line of victories and the birth of a nickname: ‘The Ice Kings’. City won ten games in a row – seven in the league and three in the FA Cup – before Tottenham managed a 2-2 draw on 23 March 1963.

 

There were plenty of rearranged games to fit in though, leading to fixture congestion that would terrify the players and managers of today. Remarkably, City faced Manchester United at Old Trafford on 15 April and the return fixture was played the following day.

 

Nearly 40,000 fans packed into Filbert Street for the visit of United before the doors were locked and some supporters were reduced to waiting in the terraced streets outside, listening intently for the roar of those inside.

 

Another young City fan, John Wright, was one of the unlucky ones.

 

‘My brother had managed to get in but I was outside in a crowd around the exit gates where people were sitting on the wall and telling us what was happening,’ he says. ‘There seemed to be a few hundred or more but it’s difficult to say as going to the football was a completely new experience for me, never mind being locked out.’

 

Unfortunately, he missed a classic.

 

Despite struggling in the league, United had stars like Bobby Charlton and Denis Law in their side. Law scored a hat-trick, including an exceptional bicycle kick, but it was in vain. City top goalscorer Ken Keyworth’s own hat-trick at the other end took just six minutes as the game ended 4-3 to City.

The Ice Kings were top of the table with five league games and one FA Cup semi-final remaining. Four days after seeing off United, a 1-1 draw with Wolverhampton Wanderers was a setback but the chance of glory remained.

 

Those who remember the early 1960s are able to reel off the team with little hesitation: Banks, Sjoberg, Norman, McLintock, King, Appleton, Riley, Cross, Keyworth, Gibson, Stringfellow.

 

Today’s team is similarly settled and will also be remembered as a collective for years to come: Schmeichel, Simpson, Huth, Morgan, Fuchs, Albrighton, Drinkwater, Kanté, Mahrez, Okazaki, Vardy.

 

Davie Gibson was magical, the artist, the creator who made City tick with his skill and invention, the Mahrez of the Ice Kings, but the real similarity was in the counter-attacking style of play, an approach that did not go unnoticed when City lined up against Bill Shankly’s Liverpool at Hillsborough for their FA Cup semi-final. The management team of Matt Gillies and Bert Johnson were renowned for their tactical innovation, with Graham Cross and Frank McLintock swapping places while other sides stuck rigidly to a 2-3-5 formation.

 

Club historian Hutchinson has spoken to several of the Ice Kings about the lessons Liverpool learned that afternoon.

 

‘They all told me that Shankly criticised the way Leicester played in the semi-final,’ he says. ‘The following season though, he adopted the same tactics which I think is quite an accolade.’

 

City beat Liverpool 1-0 to reach the final but perhaps the prospect of the big day ahead at Wembley acted as a distraction. The final four league games of the season all ended in defeat and the team finished in fourth place.

 

Still, they were red hot favourites to win the FA Cup against a Manchester United side that had just finished fourth bottom of the league.

 

The final score was Manchester United 3 Leicester City 1.

 

‘Losing in the cup final has stuck with me more than the league failure,’ says John Wright. ‘Perhaps that’s because we were favourites right up to the kick-off.

 

‘I’ve always wanted to win the FA Cup – maybe because it seemed more achievable, because of the past failures, or simply because I’m a tad envious that a club of our standing has never won it when even the likes of Coventry and Wigan have done.

 

‘I’ve never really thought about winning the league. Certainly not in recent memory and due to past near misses I don’t like to think about it. After all, it wasn’t that long ago that we were a team winning 3-0 at half time that went on to lose 4-3. For most of my time supporting Leicester, that has been nearer the norm than winning.

 

‘If we were to win the league, I think I could retire happily from attending City games. My wife has always wanted to live on the coast.’

For Hutchinson, the opportunity to meet and interview heroes from his childhood has been a privilege and he is thrilled by how this season is panning out. The current side’s success has brought the Ice Kings back into the spotlight but now the question is whether City can complete that final step of the journey.

 

‘People are excited,’ says Hutchinson. ‘The place is buzzing because the global interest in the club is phenomenal. A lot of people have been here for several years and have seen everything from relegation to League One through to where we are now.

 

‘The people who work here are Leicester City supporters. There’s excitement. There’s disbelief. There’s also caution.

 

‘Until I went to university in 1967, I just always assumed Leicester City were a top side. When they went down in 1969 it was a huge shock. I was lucky as a fan growing up in the 1960s because they had some great players: Banks, McLintock, Gibson, Dougan, Sinclair, Clarke, Rodrigues, Shilton, Nish.

‘It’s great now to be back to where we were then. It brings back how I felt when I was a kid. This is fantastic. We’re at the top. This is special.’

Brizzle Fox

Brizzle Fox

Posted
Posted

The Northcroft book is a different level than all of the others and probably the only one you need. I got the hardback half price in Foyles a while ago so worth shopping around.

oxford blue

oxford blue

Posted
Posted

Thanks for posting this topic as I'd not been aware of Fearless (a trip to The Works beckons). If I was to have just one of the others I would go for The Immortals being the most detailed and comprehensive, but still very readable. 

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