In Episode 32, we take a history lesson with David Bolchover’s book about Béla Guttman, The Greatest Comeback – From Genocide to Football Glory. This is a remarkable and very tragic story, one that is as much about the treatment of Jews in Europe as about Guttman himself.

Béla Guttman played football for mostly Jewish teams in his native Hungary and then in Austria and the US. But it’s as a coach that he found global fame, winning the European Cup two years in a row with Benfica in the early ‘60s. Beyond the football pitch, Guttman survived the Holocaust by hiding in a friend’s attic and later escaped from a labour camp as countless friends and family perished at the hands of the Nazis.

This is a long way from James Milner’s Ask a Footballer.

Welcome to our first bonus episode - it's the Ademola Bookmen Podcast Injury Time [insert whistle sound here].

Today, Al and John are competing against each other to pick the best 5-a-side team of historic Irish Premier League players. Much less an idle barstool conversation, this discussion has an outcome. Yes, courtesy of cutting edge Artificial Intelligence technology, we can tell you whose team would have won.

Music by that dastardly handsome Darragh Fenlon.

Please do tune in to find out whether John knows more than Al about the Irish greats. It's Injury Time...

In Episode 31, we tackle the autobiography of famous Ruud Van Nistelrooy botherer Martin Keown. A member of The Invincibles, a double-double winner, and the owner of the most elbowed face in Premier League history, Keown played more than 300 times for Arsenal and 43 times for England.

In his 2024 book, Keown takes us through a career which brought him to Arsenal, Brighton, Villa, Everton, Arsenal again, Leicester and Reading. For whatever reason, in the audiobook version of the book – which Martin reads – he does the voices of the various people he encounters along the way. A bold choice.

Tune in to find out what it was that made Martin tick and to discover whether Al does a better impression of Martin’s father.

Please do like and subscribe.

Was Sócrates the coolest footballer ever?

Not only did he complete a medical degree while playing as a professional footballer, captain the Brazil national team, and found Corinthians Democracy, a movement which is credited with inspiring the people of Brazil to overthrow a military dictatorship, he did it all while looking like a stone cold cool motherfucker.

In Episode 30 of the Ademola Bookmen Podcast, we review Doctor Sócrates: Footballer, Philosopher, Legend, the 2017 biography of the great man by Brazil-based journalist Andrew Downie.

Do check it out and find out if Sócrates was even cooler than Cole Palmer. And please be sure to like and subscribe.

How do you follow a 5-time Ballon D’or winner? Well, with an 8-time Ballon D’or Winner of course. That’s right, its Part II of the Guillem Balague GOAT saga and our review of his biography of one Lionel Messi.

Originally published in 2013 but updated for the Argentina World Cup win in 2022, the book is a long one, covering the descent from heaven of the baby Messi to the unassuming city of Rosario, tucked away on the Rio Paraná, a few hundred miles inland from Buenos Aires.

With interviews from various people who touched the hem of his garment along the way, the book very extensively covers how Messi touched the lives of the earthlings who had the privilege of sharing the planet with him. The book also includes references to El Diablo, Cristiano Ronaldo, with a sterling supporting role from arch bean-counter, Jorge Messi. And of course, Messi’s grandmother.

As of some day last week, we were just two spots below Balague in the football podcast charts so please do have a listen and give us the chance of leapfrogging the Messi hagiographer. And if you like it, well please do like it…

It’s our 28th episode and we are starting the new year with the first part of the Balague GOAT saga. First up is his award-winning biography of Cristiano Ronaldo.

This player certainly needs no introduction but if you insist then 5 Champions League wins, 5 Ballons D’or, and seven straight calendar years in which he scored more than 50 goals will surely suffice.

We had initially planned to read Balague’s Messi biography first, but when we learned we had 7 days to get through its 796 pages, we pivoted and decided instead to read the mere 384 pages he wrote on his sworn enemy instead. But worry not dear listener, for Messi is up next (assuming we can finish it in time…).

Happy New Year folks. Please do listen, like and subscribe.

In Episode 27, we take a stroll down memory lane with Ireland’s arch controversialist Eamon Dunphy. Before he became a fixture on Irish television attacking the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo and Rod Liddle, Dunphy was once a footballer.

He is remembered more for his work as a journalist and television malcontent than for his performances for Ireland, Millwall, Reading and Charlton. But it was his 1976 diary Only a Game? that launched Dunphy’s media career, starting him out on a road that led him to becoming a fixture on Irish television channels for around 30 years.

The book itself is very much a classic of the footballer autobiography genre, described by Nick Hornby no less as the “best book about football I have ever read by someone who has actually played the game professionally”.

Join Al and Johnny for Episode 27 and find out if it really was just only a game for Dunphy and his fellow Millwall players in 1973.

Hungary’s ‘Galloping Major’, Ferenc Puskás was a three time European Cup winner and the winner of ten domestic titles, split evenly with five in his home country and five in Spain.

His 1956 autobiography, Captain of Hungary, was written after he led Hungary to the 1954 World Cup final but before his exploits in Spain playing with Real Madrid and a management career that saw him lead teams in ten different countries. The book was also written before the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 with much of the focus on Puskás’ travels on either side of the Iron Curtain with the Hungary national team.

To those who do remember him, Puskás was a goal machine, the 7th highest scorer of all time. He was also, on the basis of this book, a damn fine fellow. We really enjoyed this one.

Please do have a listen and be sure to like and subscribe.

Köszönöm!