In 'Cricket, A Very Peculiar History' Jim Pipe uniquely explores one of the second biggest spectator sport on the planet. From the hazy bat-and-ball origins of the game to the biggest celebrity players of today, this book is a fascinating insight into the popular sport. Filled to the brim with quirky quotes, fantastic facts and surprising statistics, 'Cricket, A Very Peculiar History' is the perfect book for any fan of the game. You'll discover bizarre cricket lingo, politics and rivalries and even how to make the perfect cricket tea, along with some bizarre but classic tales, without which the game would not be the same.

Of the global community of cricketers, the West Indians are, arguably, the most well-known and feared. This book shows how this tradition of cricketing excellence and leadership emerged, and how it contributed to the rise of West Indian nationalism and independence.

'It is now thirty-five years since Geoffrey Moorhouse wrote his cricket classic The Best Loved Game, which also seems unimaginable, but only because it feels like last week. Even so, in that time the game has changed, in many respects beyond recognition, which makes the book more valuable than ever - as an elegy for a lost world.' Matthew Engel, in his new Preface Geoffrey Moorhouse spent the summer of 1978 sampling cricket at every level: from Eton v Harrow to the Lancashire League; from Cambridge undergraduates getting a lesson from Zaheer Abbas to Ian Botham excelling with bat and ball at Lord's; from a farmer's boy making an unbeaten 24 at an Oxfordshire village match to the incomparable clowning of Derek Randall at Trent Bridge. 'Surely destined to rest beside the finest works of this nature in the library of cricket.' David Frith, Wisden Cricket Monthly

A life starting in the Depression of the 1920's through the war years (evacuation & National Service) to present day.

The Stranded Tribe is the neglected story of the Ulster Unionists who were compelled to become part of the new Catholic and Gaelic Irish Free State in 1922. It follows the lives of the Presbyterian working-class Vance family, especially the two sons, William and Jamie, in the turbulent period of Irish history between 1895 and 1923. They live and work in East Donegal where one becomes involved with a local Ulster Volunteer unit and the other becomes a local railway official. In 1914 William Vance responds to the Empires call to fight Germany and joins the Ulster Division. As a member of the 11th Inniskilling Fusiliers, he takes part in the unbelievable slaughter of the first day of the Battle of the Somme in 1916. Later, his brother joins the same regiment and is badly wounded during the Battle of Messines. Following a long recovery he takes on security work on the Donegal Railways and plays a significant part in trying to forestall guerrilla attacks by the IRA on its services. The brother of Jamies Catholic girlfriend is an IRA leader in Donegal. In the Civil War he is on the Anti-Treaty side and both he and Jamie are drawn into the conflict in West Fermanagh where the IRA invades Northern Irelands territory in an attempt to destabilise the six-county statelet. The Loyalists in the three mainly Nationalist and Catholic Ulster counties not included in the new Northern Ireland have most of their links with the UK broken and some of them suffer persecution. Death threats against Jamie Vance and his family force him to take a temporary job in Scotland. Here, he finds himself struggling against a desperate, high-level assassination plot which threatens to destroy the shaky relationship between Britain and the new Irish Free State which is struggling to rout the Irregular forces in Ireland. The book outlines the brutal struggle between the two conceptions of Ireland the nationalist Catholic and Gaelic one and the unionist pro-British and monarchical one. But it also takes some of the simplicity out of this division by showing the many variations on both sides. The great majority of the incidents in the book are based upon real events gleaned from books and newspapers of the period. Research for the book took five years as well as significant time in the area itself. The Stranded Tribe is not only about the drawing of a new boundary in Ireland between mainly Protestant and Catholic states. It is also about political, religious and community responses to a world facing unprecedented social and technological change.

In addition to being an internationally recognised pioneer of sports history, Brian Stoddart has also been a leading thinker and influence in the field. That influence has crossed several areas of history, sociology, business, politics and media aspects of sports studies, and has drawn deeply upon his own training in Asian studies. His work has been characterised by cross-disciplinary work from the outset, and has encompassed some very different geographical areas as well as crossing from academic outlets to media commentary. As a result, his influential work has appeared in many different locations, and it has been difficult for a wide variety of readers to access it fully and easily. This volume draws together, in the one place for the first time, some of his most important academic and journalistic work. Importantly, the pieces are drawn together by an intellectual/autobiographical commentary that locates each piece in a wider social and cultural framework. This book was previously published as a special issue of Sport in Society

Over his long career as a cricket commentator and journalist, Ralph Dellor has met some of the greatest exponents of the "summer" game. In the 1990s he conducted a series of face-to-face taped interviews with famous cricketers past and present. Nine of these extraordinary interviews have now been captured in the written word. Ralph and his fellow sports journalist, Stephen Lamb, have edited and annotated the interviews so they are put into context of time and place. Each chapter is a classic piece of cricketing history, and an insight into the legends and lore of the game.

As the civilised world fought for its very survival, Sir Home Gordon, writing in The Cricketer in September 1939, stated that ‘England has now started the grim Test Match with Germany’, the objective of which was to ‘win the Ashes of civilisation’. Despite the interruption of first-class and Test cricket in England, the game continued to be played and watched by hundreds of thousands of people engaged in military and civilian service. In workplaces, cricket clubs, and military establishments, as well as on the famous grounds of the country, players of all abilities kept the sporting flag flying to sustain morale. Matches raised vast sums for war charities whilst in the north and midlands, competitive League cricket continued, with many Test and county players being employed as weekend professionals by the clubs. Further afield the game continued in all the Test-playing nations and in further-flung outposts around the world. Troops stationed in Europe, Africa and the Far East seized on any opportunity to play cricket, often in the most unusual of circumstances. Luxurious sporting clubs in Egypt hosted matches that pitted English service teams against their Commonwealth counterparts. Luminaries such as Wally Hammond and Lindsay Hassett were cheered on by their uniformed countrymen. Inevitably there was a sombre side to cricket’s wartime account. From renowned Test stars such as Hedley Verity to the keen but modest club player, many cricketers paid the ultimate price for Allied victory. The Victory Tests of 1945 were played against a backdrop of relief and sorrow. Nevertheless, cricket would emerge intact into the post-war world in broadly the same format as 1939. The game had sustained its soul and played its part in the sad but necessary victory of the Grim Test.

To understand modern India, one must look at the business of cricket within the country. When Lalit Modi--an Indian businessman with a criminal record, a history of failed business ventures, and a reputation for audacious deal making--created a Twenty20 cricket league in India in 2008, the odds were stacked against him. International cricket was still controlled from London, where they played the long, slow game of Test cricket by the old rules. Indians had traditionally underperformed in the sport but the game remained a national passion. Adopting the highly commercial American model of sporting tournaments, and throwing scantily clad western cheerleaders into the mix, Modi gave himself three months to succeed. And succeed he did--dazzlingly--before he and his league crashed to earth amid astonishing scandal and corruption. The emergence of the IPL is a remarkable tale. Cricket is at the heart of the miracle that is modern India. As a business, it represents everything that is most dynamic and entrepreneurial about the country's economic boom, including the industrious and aspiring middle-class consumers who are driving it. The IPL also reveals, perhaps to an unprecedented degree, the corrupt, back-scratching, and nepotistic way in which India is run. A truly original work by a brilliant journalist, The Great Tamasha* makes the complexity of modern India--its aspiration and optimism straining against tradition and corruption--accessible like no other book has. *Tamasha: a Hindi world meaning "a spectacle."

Cricket on Everest starts with an idea over a pint of beer and ends with a world record at 5,165 metres above sea level. In 2009, 50 people from the UK, many of whom had never met until a year earlier, played the highest ever game of cricket on the slopes of the world’s tallest mountain. The idea captured the imagination of people around the globe, making front page news in several countries; being followed by millions through daily TV news updates and raising more than £100k for charity. What people did not see, however, was what happened behind the scenes. The book details several near-misses that the organisers kept quiet – including securing permission to enter the National Park where Everest is situated just a day before the group were due to arrive. Friendships were pushed to the very limit and many people gave their all to organise a once-in-a-lifetime experience. The heartache from several people dropping out of the expedition was counteracted by the highs of taking part in such a unique and life-changing experience. Ultimately, this a story of 50 people going outside of their comfort zones to achieve something many thought impossible. It brought people and communities together, changed the lives of many and reminded everyone that adventure is accessible to anyone. Cricket on Everest will appeal to fans of sport and travel writing. Author Alan has been inspired by Harry Thompson’s Penguins Stopped Play and Jon Krakauer’s Into Thin Air.