The Ademola Bookmen Podcast

Episode 34: Eric Cantona – The Rebel Who Would Be King by Philippe Auclair

In Episode 34, we review Philippe Auclair’s book about arguably the greatest of all Premier League players and certainly the coolest – Eric Cantona.
 
French football’s enfant terrible washed up on the shores of British football seeking refuge from the tyranny of the French FA’s capricious officials. Driven from his home country due to his uncontrollable temper, Cantona left behind Marseilles, Auxerre, Nimes, and the various other clubs he played for in France, arriving in Sheffield a desolate but still proud figure. A trial there and a brief (league winning) stint at Leeds later, he found himself in that golden city on the hill, Manchester United. There he found a home, he found a family, and he remade English football in his own divine image. Then he fucked off to go acting…
 
Tune in to find out all the things he did when he wasn’t kicking that Palace fan.

Injury Time 3: Ginger Spice - The Red Hair 5-a-side draft

In our third instalment of Ademola Bookmen Injury Time, we are doing a 5-a-side draft of red hair footballers. Yes folks, its Ginger Spice, the Red Hair Draft. Tune in to find out if Al can save some blushes and finally get a win.

Episode 33: In Search of Duncan Ferguson by Alan Patullo

In Episode 33, we review In Search of Duncan Ferguson – The Life and Crimes of a Footballing Enigma by Alan Patullo.
 
The highest scoring Scot in the Premier League, Ferguson is a folk hero on the blue half of Merseyside. As well as Everton, Ferguson had stints of varying degrees of success and failure with Dundee United, Rangers, and Newcastle United. But he is perhaps best known for his brushes with the law and with home intruders. Famously, he went to jail for headbutting Josh McStay of Raith Rovers and consigned a series of burglars to a similar fate. 
 
Tune in to find out whether we managed to find Duncan. Please do like and subscribe.

Injury Time 2 - Prison 5-a-side draft (the Joey Barton Cup)

Join us for our second installment of Injury Time, a prison 5-a-side draft.
The quality of players who have been to prison is really quite something, rich pickings indeed. Please do tune in to find out if Al can salvage some pride after his devastating loss in the previous draft. 
Music by Darragh Fenlon. 

Episode 32: Béla Guttman - The Greatest Comeback by David Bolchover

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.
 
 

Injury Time 1 - Irish Premier League 5-a-side smackdown

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...

Episode 31: Martin Keown - On The Edge

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.

Episode 30: Doctor Socrates - Footballer, Philosopher, Legend by Andrew Downie

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.

Episode 29: Messi - The Definitive Biography by Guillem Balague

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…

Episode 28: Cristiano Ronaldo - The Biography by Guillem Balague

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.