I received my copy from the author himself (Stuart Roach) on Christmas morning, and my initial findings are that this is an excellent read (and I'm not just saying that....honest
). The book features Murts, Hunt and Hammond (amongst many others). Here are some pars taken from the book (used with permision from the author), which you may enjoy......
Even when the door handle does finally turn and the manager enters the room, the stillness hangs for a few seconds more; a moment frozen in time. When the silence is finally broken, when Coppell begins his summing up of the first half of a game which could define the season, it is not the reaction any of them had been expecting. “I am disappointed in you,” Coppell says in monotone annunciation. “So disappointed.”
The brief delivery is replaced by the returning silence, giving the players a moment to understand the verdict. Every chastened schoolboy knows, deep down within his innermost fears, that he will be able to deal with the rebuke of a returning father, that it is the anticipation which heightens the anxiety. But paternal disappointment is an altogether harder emotion to handle.
Coppell elaborates only briefly before leaving his players to their own thoughts and returning to take in the remainder of the action, this time from the pitchside dug-out. Five Reading goals later the final whistle heralds a pitch invasion from the home fans, a swarm of buzzing excitement on the pitch that sweeps the players down the tunnel and back in to the home team dressing room. Minutes later, but a full hour after he had left that room, Coppell is turning the handle again and entering the champions’ dressing room, where the acoustics are in full affect.
Murts “Pardew and Coppell are chalk and cheese. Alan Pardew managed in your face; a high-tempo, loud, confident cock-of-the-walk kind of bloke who demands something from you every second of the day; Steve Coppell is very much into the self discipline side where you are responsible for your performance.
“He thinks if you are not motivated then you shouldn’t be playing football. You have to want it; you really have to be self conditioned, self motivating and self aware and I think that is something that playing under Steve helped me become. You have to know your roles, know what you are good at, what you are not good at and play to your strengths. I think Steve helped me identify them as well as anyone else.
Hammond Hammond explained: “Steve likes familiarity, he likes to know in a player what he’s going to get. He doesn’t like to be surprised and with Ivar he knew exactly what he was getting. Ivar had played for him at Brentford and at Brighton and we knew him well. He was out of the team at Wolves and he was a good take at the time, a player who has proved to be an outstanding signing for Reading Football Club.
The significance of the signing was not lost on Murty, either. He said: “I think Ivar has played for him more than any other player and it speaks volumes that he is the ultimate professional. He makes sure he takes care of himself, he gives everything in training and you know what you are going to get. He is Mr Reliable and I think he is the archetypal Steve Coppell footballer.”
Hammond “Steve enjoyed the trips to Ireland; we had someone pick him up and look after him and he would pull his bobble hat down and coat collars up and go to the local pub, have a pint of Guinness and watch the game. I don’t think he was anonymous, most times he got spotted, but he’s not a great one for going to games. He didn’t do an enormous amount of scouting because his focus was always the team.
BBC Match of the Day commentator Jonathan Pearce was an interested observer at that time and was not surprised at his handling of the situation, having known the Reading manager since his days covering Crystal Palace for Capital Radio. “The whole Hunt thing with Chelsea became a rabid affair and the way Steve diplomatically dealt with that was fantastic. His was the voice of reason”.
Obviously, this is not a Reading FC book. It also talks about playing for Utd and England, the Man City role, and how he left Brighton for Reading (very interesting).
Amazon link - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Steve-Coppell-Prayer-Stuart-Roach/dp/1848185170/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1262695980&sr=1-1
Also, on sale in the Megastore.
Go and buy in your thousands.....and earn me a couple of pints.
