My Life In Football By Kevin Keegan Release date: 18th April, 2019 Publisher: Macmillan List Price: £9.99 Our Price: £6.49 You Save: £3.5 (35%) Buy Now

As a young boy, I saw Kevin Keegan make his debut for Liverpool against Nottingham Forest on the first day of the 1971-72 season. Keegan scored the game’s opening goal after 12 minutes, cementing his place in the hearts of 51,000 fans who loved his tenacity, enthusiasm, bravery and, in time, an uncanny, almost telepathic understanding with John Toshack. Manager Bill Shankly had bought KK from Scunthorpe for the ridiculous price of £35,000 after first seeing him as a 17-year-old in an oversized shirt playing on the right wing. Keegan jointly dedicates My Life In Football to his wife and to Shanks who ensured that the young man would become one of the world’s best footballers. Keegan’s story is well known. In six glorious seasons at Anfield, he won three league titles, an FA Cup, three Charity Shields, two UEFA Cups and, memorably in 1977, Liverpool’s first European Cup. In 1976, he was also voted Footballer of the Year. Supporters were initially puzzled at his decision to leave Anfield for Hamburg, a brave move considering the success he had enjoyed, but it could be argued, as Keegan did prior to his departure, that the move would make him a better footballer. And so it proved; he would become the only British player to win the coveted Ballon D’Or in successive seasons. Later, he would team up with Chris Waddle and Peter Beardsley at Newcastle, but it was his return to Newcastle as manager that rekindled the passion of a footballing public starved of success for decades and upon which much of My Life In Football concentrates. The team’s style of play, coupled with high-profile expenditure on players such as Alan Shearer and Les Ferdinand ensured that Keegan and his Newcastle team carried their ‘entertainers’ label with ease. Keegan’s managerial tenure at St James’s Park coincided with the most exciting times in Newcastle’s recent history. He was Shanly-esque in instilling belief in the team and the city, proving that both could live with the big boys. Yes, Newcastle missed out on the league title, but it’s easy to see why Keegan was known locally as the Messiah. My Life In Football mirrors Keegan’s personality, which means you’re unlikely to read a more brutally honest and open sporting autobiography.