Book of the week: Football Clichés by Adam Hurrey

Book of the week

This affectionate dissection of the game’s well-worn phrases mildly mocks a few of the more tired ones, for instance “slide rule pass” – who uses a slide rule these days? – but points out that new ones are still being coined; apparently, Jose Mourinho first used the now-ubiquitous “parking the bus” as recently as 2004.

As for TV pundits, what, according to Alan Hansen, do defenders fear most? All together now: “pace”, be it searing, blistering, lightning, explosive, in abundance, bags of, to burn, genuine and on occasion even deceptive. For me, this is a top, top effort by the boy Hurrey, and at the end of the day you can’t say fairer than that.

Published in hardback by Headline, £12.99