Twins Zack and Zoe investigate when someone mails Zach a soccer jersey, identical to the one he wears on his travel team, with no explanation.

This updated edition of the bestselling and wildly popular I Am the Secret Footballer features a new introduction and an additional chapter. The anonymous writer of The Guardian's "Secret Footballer" column gives Premiere League fans an insider's look into the unseen world of professional football. It is often said that 95% of what happens in football takes place behind closed doors. Many of these stories I shouldn't be telling you. But I will. Who is The Secret Footballer? Only a few people know the true identity of the man inside the game. Whoever he is-and whatever team he plays for-TSF is always honest, fearless and opinionated. Here he takes readers past the locker-room door and reveals the inner-workings of a professional club, the exhilarating highs and crushing lows and what it's really like to do the job most of us can only dream of doing. TSF chronicles the exploits of his Premiership colleagues with a gimlet eye and frank humour. Managers, agents and players are not spared from his observations-their mindsets, their relationships with those outside the sport, their behaviour good and bad. In his inimitable style, TSF recounts entertaining and eyebrow-raising vignettes, naming names and dropping colourful details along the way.

The third installment of the Zach and Zoe Mysteries--a sports-themed chapter book mystery series by New York Times bestselling author Mike Lupica. There's nothing eight-year-old twins Zach and Zoe Walker love more than playing sports and solving mysteries. And when those two worlds collide . . . well, it doesn't get any better than that. In their third mystery, Zach and Zoe discover their recess football has been completely deflated, leaving them without a ball to play with. But who's behind it? By searching for clues around the school, Zach and Zoe uncover the truth behind the damaged ball, and learn the importance of friendship, inclusion, and being conscious of other people's feelings. Ending with a big Walker Family Thanksgiving Turkey Bowl game, The Football Fiasco is the perfect fall chapter book! In the opening installments of the Zach and Zoe Mysteries, bestselling author Mike Lupica begins a series for a new and younger audience, introducing readers to a sports-loving detective duo who can swing for the fences and catch the culprit in one fell swoop. With a recipe equal parts sports and mystery, the Zach and Zoe Mysteries break fresh ground for an author who has been called the greatest sportswriter for kids.

For use in schools and libraries only. The Aldens are excited to be playing in their summer soccer league, until someone begins sabotaging the teams.

The truth about professional football by the man on the inside.

FOOTBALL'S BIGGEST CHARACTERS TELL IT LIKE IT IS Who is the Secret Footballer? Well he's back and this time his mates speak out too. Players, agents, coaches and managers give you access to all areas of the Premier League. From deal-making to play-making, from dodgy tactics to drunken antics, they reveal the unforgettable highs and the unforgivable lows. This is football as you've never seen it before. 'What happens behind closed doors at Premiership clubs usually stays firmly shut behind closed doors. Not if the Secret Footballer has anything to do with it.' Loaded **From the bestselling author of I am the Secret Footballer and The Secret Footballer's Guide to the Modern Game.**

Why does a football spiral? How do some athletes jump so high? The answer is science! The Secret Science of Sports helps kids better understand concepts of science, technology, engineering, and math through the sports they love to play and watch. Every sport -- from baseball to basketball, to football and soccer, to wrestling, tennis, and lacrosse -- involves a bit of science, technology, engineering, and math. You can't throw a ball without Newton's Law of Motion, and you can't calculate a player's stats without math. And every type of sports equipment -- a helmet, cleats, shoulder or knee pads -- were designed with the latest engineering and technology. The Secret Science of Sports breaks down normally difficult STEM concepts like forces of motion, gravity, algebra, and even neuroscience, in a language kids can -- and will want to -- understand. Divided into sections like chemistry, biology, physics, technology, and more, this handy guide uses examples from sports like soccer, baseball, softball, football, hockey, lacrosse, tennis, and others to explain important STEM concepts for kids ages 8 to 12. They'll learn how to use math to calculate a batter's average, why a tennis racket is shaped the way it is, how biology affects athletic performance, the aerodynamics behind competitive swimsuits, and much more. With dozens of original, captivating illustrations to engage young readers, kids will have fun while learning about key STEM ideas that will prepare them for years of schooling to come.

Nadia is playing for her local soccer team, and they have made it all the way to the national tournament—against some very determined opposition. Unfortunately, Nadia's challenges don't just come from her opponents but from her teammates as well. After their coach is injured in a suspicious accident and the threats against the team mount, it is up to Nadia and her younger brother Devin to pull the team together and take a run at the championship. Another wild ride!

A no-holds-barred exposé on the financial transactions of the world's favourite sport The transfer fees clubs pay to sign top players now top €4 billion a year but much of the money has been flowing out of the game. A small group of wealthy investors including Russian oligarchs, English racehorse owners and a former billionaire gold miner have seized the opportunity to enter this booming market. Some have moved in on the territory of banks and lent money to clubs in exchange for a share in fees generated by Cristiano Ronaldo, Neymar and dozens more of today's stars. Others have acquired obscure teams to get a piece of the pie. Even as the global financial crisis sent fortunes tumbling this select group found a profitable place to park their money. The size of the transfer market has continued to rise –- it increased seven-fold in value the last two decades, more than the FTSE share index. Between them, these wealthy investors have amassed hundreds of millions of euros in profits. At the same time, they have managed to stay out of the spotlight the world’s most popular sport brings. Football’s Secret Trade follows the money along a trail very few know about, from nondescript offices in the U.K. and ramshackle stadiums of South American clubs you have probably never heard of to offshore bank accounts in the Caribbean. Warning – you won’t see a major transfer deal in the same light again.

One overeducated Florida State fan confronts the religiously perverted, racially suspect, and sexually fraught nature of the sport she hates to love: college football. Diane Roberts is a self-described feminist with a PhD from Oxford. She's also a second-generation season ticket holder—and an English professor—at one of the elite college football schools in the country. It's not as if she approves of the violence and hypermasculinity on display; she just can't help herself. So every Saturday from September through December she surrenders to her Inner Barbarian. The same goes for the rest of her "tribe," those thousands of hooting, hollering, beer-swilling Seminoles who, like Roberts, spent the 2013–14 season basking in the loping, history-making Hail Marys of Jameis Winston, the team's Heisman-winning quarterback, when they weren't gawking, dumbstruck, at the headlines in which he was accused of sexual assault. In Tribal, Roberts explores college football's grip on the country at the very moment when gender roles are blurring, social institutions are in flux, and the question of who is—and is not—an American is frequently challenged. For die-hard fans, the sport is a comfortable retreat into tradition, proof of our national virility, and a reflection of an America without troubling ambiguities. Yet, Roberts argues, it is also a representation of the buried heart of this country: a game and a culture built upon the dark past of the South, secrets so obvious they hide in plain sight. With her droll Southern voice and a phrase-turning style reminiscent of Roy Blount Jr. and Sarah Vowell, Roberts offers a sociological unpacking of the sport's dubious history that is at once affectionate and cautionary.