Tom Palmer (2)

There have been several books in the past on what it’s like to follow Leeds United, notably Jeffries’ and Marr’s Love hurts, and there will no doubt be more, but Palmer’s year in the life as a White will be hard to beat. From the highs to the lows, this book captures perfectly the agony and ecstasy of following a club, and while you never know what is going to happen next, there always seems something worth looking forward to. From radio, to tele-text, to away matches, sometimes you wish you were there; sometimes you have to put up with people wondering why you bother. For fellow Leeds fans though, it all makes perfect sense.… (meer)

3rd in series but you do not need to read the first 2. Danny is a mad soccer fan and amateur detective. He has a blind father, an obnoxious older sister, a strained relationship with his best friend who is a girl and a driving ambition to be a private detective. His attempts to spy on the goings on at his beloved soccer club City, in an effort to discover who is bidding to take over the club however, lead him to be arrested by the police for trespassing and it seems all his dreams of being a policeman will be shattered by this one silly act. These concerns however are nothing compared to the fate of Kofi, a talented Ghanaian soccer player who is supposedly "talent scouted" by City from the slums of Africa. The dream of helping his family out of poverty lead him to risk his entire extended families' earnings (they even sell the family home) in an effort to get him to England. However, when he arrives at Heathrow, there is no-one to meet him and it is all a terrible sham. Kofi, overcome with the shame of letting his family down, walks from Heathrow to the City oval, hoping for a tryout. He meets Danny who convinces him to go to his friend in the press Anton and tell his story. But little does Danny, Kofi and Anton know who they are dealing with, as the unscrupuolous con-man kidnaps Anton and threatens to kill Kofi and his family in Ghana if he breathes another word to the press. A gripping and poignant story of risks people take when faced with very little choice. Gripping and engrossing from start to finish. Highly recommended for teenage boys.… (meer)