Football Business

The first edition of The Price of Football quickly established itself as the go-to guide to understanding football club finance for the serious fan. Kieran Maguire, one of the UK’s top football finance analysts, shows how professional clubs operate as businesses and explains, in non-technical language, how to read, understand, and interrogate club accounts.

It doesn't really matter who you support. Football is a cruel, cruel game. All of us fans have had moments of shock, disappointment, and feeling like a right knobhead. As I talk you through everything from transfers to trophies to touchline tantrums, join me as I give my definitive take on football. There's a lot to get through, so take my hand like an over-eager mascot and walk with me out of the tunnel into the glaring floodlights of what it means to be a fan…and how to survive it.

What is talent? How do you fulfil your potential? How do you create a winning team? These three simple questions, which are fundamental to the running of any successful business, take Ben Lyttleton on a fascinating journey to some of the world's top football clubs to discover the innovative new methods of developing and maximising talent.

In The World’s Biggest Cash Machine, informed by interviews with key figures behind the scenes, award-winning journalist and commentator Chris Blackhurst charts the gripping story of the world’s biggest football club - as well as exploring the wider transformation of the Premier League into a playground for billionaire owners.

Real Madrid is the most successful sports team on the planet. The soccer club has more trophies than any other sports team, including 11 UEFA Champions League trophies. However, the story behind the triumph goes beyond the players and coaches. Generally unnoticed, a management team consisting mostly of outsiders took the team from near bankruptcy to the most valuable sports organization in the world. How did Real Madrid achieve such extraordinary success? Columbia Business School adjunct professor Steven G. Mandis investigates.

Revised and updated with new material from the paperback edition. Includes a prelude read by Sir Alex Ferguson. Sir Alex Ferguson's compelling story is always honest and revealing he reflects on his managerial career that embraced unprecedented European success for Aberdeen and 26 triumphant seasons with Manchester United.

This book is a study in high-performance sporting excellence and elite management. But more than that, it is a true insider's guide: to how Manchester City won an unprecedented and historic Treble in 2023, and how a near-perfect footballing machine was built from the ground up. Prepare for The Blueprint: a white-knuckle ride through a sporting dynasty the likes of which the game has never seen before.

The never-before-told inside story of how the Premier League became the wildest, richest, most popular entertainment business on the planet. How did English football - once known for its stale pies, bad bookkeeping and hooligans - become a commercial powerhouse and the world's premium popular entertainment? This was a business empire built in only 25 years on ambition, experimentation and gambler's luck.

Super Agent. Maverick. Reformer. Iconoclast. Dealmaker. Dentist? Jerry Argovitz has worn many hats in his remarkable life, both inside and outside of the world of sports. As a player agent representing and advising some of the biggest names in the game, Argovitz challenged the NFL both at the negotiating table and in the courtroom, earning a reputation as one of the most powerful men in professional sports.

The National Football League's current dominance has obscured how professional football got its start. In The League, John Eisenberg reveals that Art Rooney, George Halas, Tim Mara, George Preston Marshall, and Bert Bell took an immense risk by investing in the professional game. At that time, the sport barely registered on the national scene. The five owners succeeded only because at critical junctures in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, each sacrificed the short-term success of his team for the longer-term good of the League.

What does it take to thrive in one of the most pressurised leadership roles in modern times? What is the real story behind the men in the football hotseat who shape the dreams and ambitions of millions? The First 100 Days: Lessons in Leadership from the Football Bosses is both an entertaining book for football fans and a self-help manual for those embarking on a leadership challenge of their own.

Sir Alex Ferguson es uno de los pocos líderes que verdaderamente conoce su materia. En sus treinta y ocho años dentro del mundo del fútbol, Ferguson ganó la impresionante cifra de 49 títulos y fue la pieza angular que convirtió al Manchester United en una de las grandes marcas del mundo entero. Liderazgo está estructurado alrededor de las claves estratégicas y de los valores fundamentales de la vida de Ferguson. Incluye temas que se asocian con su estilo de gestión: Disciplina, Control, Trabajo en Equipo y Motivación.

In 2012, Hakeem al-Araibi was a promising young player on Bahrain's national football team when he was arrested for attacking a police station during the Arab Spring, despite television footage showing him playing soccer at the time of the alleged attack. After three months of torture and wrongful imprisonment, Hakeem was released. He fled the country and made his way to Australia, where he was granted refugee status. Hakeem made a life here and was playing for the suburban Pascoe Vale Football Club, in Melbourne. He thought he was safe.

From the post room to the board room, everyone thinks they can be the manager. But how do you manage outrageous talent? What do you do to inspire loyalty from your players? How do you turn around a team in crisis? What’s the best way to build long-term success? How can you lead calmly under pressure? The issues are the same whether you’re managing a Premier League football team or an FTSE 100 company.

Abby Wambach became a champion because of her incredible talent as a football player. She became an icon because of her remarkable wisdom as a leader. As the cocaptain of the 2015 Women's World Cup Champion Team, she created a culture not just of excellence but of honour, commitment, resilience, and sisterhood. She helped transform a group of individual women into one of the most successful, powerful and united Wolfpacks of all time.

In What It Takes to Be #1, Vince Lombardi, Jr. explores his father's leadership philosophy and extracts powerful lessons about what it takes to be an effective leader. Taking as his jumping-off point his father's legendary 1970 speech on the supreme importance of self-knowledge, character, and integrity, Lombardi, Jr. examines each of those qualities and offers guidelines on cultivating and applying them at work and in your personal life.

Chris Carlisle, former Super Bowl-champion performance coach, has written a book that blazes a clear path from where you presently are to where you expect to be. Chris’s ideas come from his own experience and work shaping the ideals of the highly motivated. From dealing with his own hardships to helping others battle through intense competitions, Carlisle has found a way to break through barriers. Step by step, Move or Die will put in motion a simple plan to move forward. Everything that you have always hoped you could be is not just a pipe dream—it can be a reality.

Mack Wiebe wanted to leave an oral history of his life for his grandkids. He sat down and started to write. As his memories flooded back, he wrote more, a lot more in a wonderful raconteur style. It all started growing up in poverty in the Great Northwest during the 1940s, then being in the Army during the Korean War, followed by football, coaching, golf, a fantastic string of luck, and a roaring ride of entrepreneurship. Yes, Mack’s grandkids have the opportunity to read and now to hear, in detail, what stock they are from.

Al Davis was such a polarizing figure that people either admired or despised him. Most cared about what Davis thought on any issue, and he was captivating before an audience. Yet Davis rarely revealed much about himself, his philosophy and decision-making. Everyone knew of Davis and his catchy slogans, especially "Just Win, Baby". But no one knew much about the man. Everyone, it seemed, had a strong opinion about Davis, but precious few had enough information about Davis to proffer an informed description.

Preparation is easy to praise but very hard to master. No modern coach, in any sport, understands that better than NFL veteran Tom Coughlin. He led the New York Giants to two Super Bowl victories with his system of relentless preparation and old-school tough-mindedness. He teaches his players that you can never guarantee a win, but you can always earn the right to win - with focus, consistency, hard work, and anticipation of obstacles. And if you’ve earned the right to win, you can sleep soundly before a big game....