Champagne Football John Delaney and the Betrayal of Irish Football: The Inside Story
Produktdetaljer
Biografisk notat
Mark Tighe (Author)
Originally from Donegal, Mark Tighe is the legal correspondent of The Sunday Times in Ireland. As well as covering legal affairs, he specialises in investigative reporting. He was Irish newspaper news reporter of the year in 2018 and 2019. In 2019 he also won the Journalist of the Year award for his reporting on the FAI.
Paul Rowan (Author)
Born and raised in Dublin, Paul Rowan is the Irish football correspondent for The Sunday Times, and the author of The Team That Jack Built. In 2019 he was joint winner of the NewsBrands Campaigning Journalism and Investigative Journalism awards (alongside Mark Tighe and Colin Coyle) for his work on the FAI.
A jaw-dropping tale of power and ego going unchecked
Times, Best Sports Books of the Year 2020
I read it in one sitting, it's a superb book ... I urge people to buy it and read it even if you're not interested in football
- Eamon Dunphy, The Stand
A cracking read ... [An] incredible amount of jaw-dropping detail
- Matt Cooper,
The most important Irish sports book of the year and most significant book on Irish life itself ... Exceptional
Irish Daily Mail
A superb piece of investigative journalism, in which a tale of tawdry venality is told with wit, verve, and just the right amount of disbelief
- Fintan O'Toole, Irish Times, Best Books of 2020
Excellent
Irish Sun
Part thriller, part warning from history, part social diary, <i>Champagne Football</i> is a forensic and often tragicomic investigation into the biggest story in Irish sport. It's a fantastic read
- Malachy Clerkin, Irish Times, Sports Books of the Year 2020
Fantastic ... The best book I've ever read about Irish football
- Ken Early, Second Captains
A damming account ... brilliantly detailed
Sunday Independent
Jaw-dropping
- Joe Duffy,
One of the most hotly-anticipated sport books of the year
- Brendan O'Connor,
A jaw-dropping story ... brilliant
Irish Times
Essential reading
Irish Daily Star
Compelling and often side-splittingly hilarious
Guardian
An absolutely extraordinary book
- Eoin McDevitt, Second Captains
Stellar work
Irish Independent
An extraordinary story of what happens when proper governance doesn't exist
Sunday Times
An astonishing exposé
- Martin Ziegler, The Times
An instant classic, one of the all-time great Irish sports books ... Terrific
- Alan English, via Twitter
A masterpiece
- Tommy Martin, via Twitter
Remarkable. The desperate story of Irish football but also a book about how Ireland works. Outstanding
- Dion Fanning,
Utterly COMPELLING ... I can't decide if Delaney is a machiavellian mastermind or a lucky chancer
- Marian Keyes, via Twitter
Made my blood boil
- Des Cahill,
Absolutely superb ... Good old fashioned gumboot journalism and a rollicking good read
- Paul Howard, via Twitter
Fantastic ... A real page-turner
- Marie Crowe, Game On
The Irish sports book of the year
Balls.ie
Excellent ... includes staggering detail
Daily Mail
Astonishing ... It reads like an outrageous work of fiction with a scarcely believable cast of characters
Business Post
Brilliant ... Easily the Irish sports book of the year
Hot Press
The most important book ever written about Irish sport ... This is the must-read of 2020
RTÉ Culture
Astonishing ... One of the most important books published in this country. If you wanted to change Ireland, you would need to read this book
- Dion Fanning, The Currency
A monumental piece of writing and investigation, a work that will go down as Irish sporting history's Woodward & Bernstein moment
Irish Examiner
THE NO.1 BESTSELLER!
'I read it in one sitting, it's a superb book' Eamon Dunphy, The Stand
'A jaw-dropping tale of power and ego going unchecked' Times, Best Sports Books of the Year 2020
Over the course of fifteen years, John Delaney ran the Football Association of Ireland as his own personal fiefdom. He had his critics, but his power was never seriously challenged until last year, when Mark Tighe and Paul Rowan published a sequence of stories in the Sunday Times containing damaging revelations about his personal compensation and the parlous financial situation of the FAI. Delaney's reputation as a great financial manager was left in tatters. He resigned under pressure, and the FAI was left hoping for a massive bail-out from the Irish taxpayer.
In Champagne Football, Tighe and Rowan dig deep into the story of Delaney's career and of the FAI's slide into ruin. They show how he surrounded himself with people whose personal loyalty he could count on, and a board that failed to notice that the association's finances were shot. They detail Delaney's skilful cultivation of opinion-formers outside the FAI. And they document the culture of excess that Delaney presided over and benefited from, to the detriment of the organization he led.
Champagne Football is a gripping, sometimes darkly hilarious and often enraging piece of reporting by the award-winning journalists who finally pulled back the curtain on the FAI's mismanagement.
WINNER OF THE AN POST IBA SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020
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'Excellent' Irish Sun
'A jaw-dropping story ... brilliant' Irish Times
'Essential reading' Irish Daily Star
'Astonishing ... Side-splittingly hilarious' Guardian
'A damming account' Sunday Independent
'An instant classic, one of the all-time great Irish sports books' Alan English
'Excellent ... includes staggering detail' Daily Mail
'A cracking read ... [An] incredible amount of jaw-dropping detail' Matt Cooper
'The most important Irish sports book of the year' Irish Daily Mail
'A masterpiece' Tommy Martin
'An absolutely extraordinary book' Eoin McDevitt, Second Captains
'Remarkable. The desperate story of Irish football but also a book about how Ireland works. Outstanding' Dion Fanning
Produktdetaljer
Biografisk notat
Mark Tighe (Author)
Originally from Donegal, Mark Tighe is the legal correspondent of The Sunday Times in Ireland. As well as covering legal affairs, he specialises in investigative reporting. He was Irish newspaper news reporter of the year in 2018 and 2019. In 2019 he also won the Journalist of the Year award for his reporting on the FAI.
Paul Rowan (Author)
Born and raised in Dublin, Paul Rowan is the Irish football correspondent for The Sunday Times, and the author of The Team That Jack Built. In 2019 he was joint winner of the NewsBrands Campaigning Journalism and Investigative Journalism awards (alongside Mark Tighe and Colin Coyle) for his work on the FAI.