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In this bonus episode, we asked Guardian football editor Marcus Christenson for his favourite sports book of all time. Here he is talking about The Miracle of Castel di Sangro, by Joe McGinniss. Enjoy *And if you haven't heard our mini-documentary on Castel di Sangro, check it out now . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. This is a public episode. If you would like to disc...

Welcome to a new episode of Between the Lines. In this one, the Guardian's football editor, Marcus Christenson, breaks down the herculean task of compiling the newspaper's list of '100 best footballers in the world'. The latest list, 2019, also saw the introduction of a women's top 100. Enjoy and please check out the series below. The 100 best footballers in the world Hosted on Acast. See acast.co...

If you've not watched the Andy Murray documentary, Resurfacing, on Amazon Prime, you need to check it out. It's exceptional. Brutally honest and with astonishing access to the man himself. I chatted to tennis commentator and host of The Tennis Podcast, David Law, about how the documentary came together and his thoughts on how Murray came across. Enjoy Martin BackPage Hosted on Acast. See acast.com...

This is a short end-of-seaon wrap where we reflect back on season two and recommend a book and a pod from 2019. Oh, and ask you all to leave a review wherever you listen to your podcasts! Have a great festive season. Martin & Neil Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonu...

This final episode of this season of Between the Lines is a documentary about one of the most beloved of all sports books, Joe McGinniss's 1999 hall-of-famer, The Miracle of Castel di Sangro. McGinniss - an American who had previously written landmark books on US politics and true crime - read a magazine piece about an Italian team's improbable rise to Serie B and decided to spend a year of his li...

In the ninth episode in this new season of Between the Lines, 26-year-old Catalan journalist Pol Ballus tells us how he went from full-time waiter and part-time freelancer to inside the machine of Pep Guardiola's Man City. Enjoy Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus epis...

In the eighth episode in this new season of Between the Lines, Martin and Neil from BackPage take you behind the scenes of their latest bestseller, Pep’s City: The Making of a Superteam . They talk about the huge editorial challenges they faced and their productive relationship with both authors, Lu Martin and Pol Ballus. Part two, Martin's chat with Pol, is out tomorrow. Enjoy Hosted on Acast. Se...

In 2006, David Goldblatt published 'The Ball is Round: A Global History of Football'. It was an extensive study of the beautiful game stretching back from its very origins into the early years of the 21st century. Job done. Or not. The last decade or so has witnessed seismic shifts in football, from its economic transformation and politicisation through to the emergence of China and United States...

Welcome to sixth episode in this new season of Between the Lines. This is my conversation with Hugh MacDonald about the sportswriting legend Hugh McIlvanney, specifically his legendary piece on Welsh boxer Johnny Owen. This is a fascinating chat not least because Hugh brings a personal element it. The two men formed a strong friendship towards the end of McIlvanney’s life and Hugh delivered the eu...

Welcome to fifth episode in this new season of Between the Lines. This is my conversation with Daniel Gray about the sportswriting legend Hugh Mcllvanney, in particular Hugh’s piece on the death of Jock Stein. Headlined ‘Worshipped by His People’, it appeared in the Observer on September 15 1985, just five days after his death. Daniel is something of an expert on Hugh McIlvanney and hosted a sold...

When Andy Mitten was commissioned to go to Mexico in search of Diego Maradona, he could have been forgiven for thinking twice. Not only was the Argentine legend one of the most elusive footballers in the world, he was also managing the Mexican second division club Dorados, who happen to be based in the State of Sinaloa. If you happen to have heard of Sinaloa, it is probably because it is home to t...

Welcome to the third episode in the new season of Between the Lines! This is Martin's conversation with Lawrence Donegan about his classic 1998 book, Four Iron in the Soul. The book tells of Lawrence's year spent caddying for Ross Drummond, then the 438th ranked golfer in the world Lynne Truss said in The Times: 'Not since Bill Bryson plotted a random route through small-town America has such a br...

For his first piece since leaving The Times to join the new staff at the UK office of The Athletic, Oli Kay chose to take Matt Jansen back to the moment when his life and career changed forever. The result was one of the most personal and touching football interviews you are likely to read - more impressive still as it came in the middle of a wave of coverage around Matt's new autobiography. Olive...

Welcome to the first episode in the new season of Between the Lines! It's playoff time in Major League Baseball and Ben Reiter is back on Between the Lines to talk about Astroball: The New Way to Win it All. Astroball is the story of how the Houston Astros went from one of the worst teams in the history of the sport - nicknamed The Disastros - to a dynastic, long-term winning machine with an analy...

Welcome to our first live episode of Between the Lines. This is a conversation between Jonathan Northcroft, chief football writer of The Sunday Times, and his counterpart at the The Times in Scotland, Michael Grant. It’s chaired by, Martin BackPage and it took place at Glasgow’s Aye Write book festival on March 29. Jonathan is the author of Deadlines and Darts with Dele and Michael wrote the defin...

**This is an episode which was released in July 2018. We are reposting it because it is a fitting reflection on the career of Andy Murray, who announced his imminent retirement from professional tennis on January 11 2019** Hugh MacDonald has been a journalist for 47 years but the most fulfilling day of his professional life came in the summer of 2013 when he watched Andy Murray win Wimbledon for t...

Jonathan Northcroft approached the World Cup in Russia this summer with a sense of trepidation. Little did he know that he would fall in love with the football and the country. In Deadlines and Darts with Dele, Jonathan offers a behind-the-scenes view of what it's like to be a frontline reporter at the biggest show on earth. In this episode, he talks to Neil BackPage about how his daily Facebook d...

Chances are you came to Michael Calvin’s writing through his later books The Nowhere Men, Living on the Volcano or Hunger in Paradise. Well, before all that, there was Family, Mike’s first book in which he was given unlimited access to a season at Millwall FC. The book also has a fascinating back-story, with Mike having self-published the first edition which was then nominated for Football Book of...

Michael Calvin’s new book is called State of Play: Under the Skin of the Modern Game. And In it, he shines a light on the human stories of football. We hear from chairmen, journeymen, female coaches, performance coaches, rights campaigners and those who fight for the soul of the national game in the light of its rampant commercialisation. As always, you’ll get a strong sense of the themes of the b...

Hugh MacDonald has been a journalist for 47 years but the most fulfilling day of his professional life came in the summer of 2013 when he watched Andy Murray win Wimbledon for the first time. Hugh had followed the Murray story for years, got to know the family and became the go-to Andy Murray reporter for media around the world. Around 6pm on July 7, he faced the task of distilling Murray’s achiev...

If you only read one article during this year’s World Cup, make it Patrick Jennings’ extensive piece on Russian football legend Lev Yashin . The image of the flat-capped goalkeeper will be everywhere this summer as part of the branding for Russia 2018. And his story is an epic tale which Jennings tells in a gripping piece of long-form journalism on the BBC website. Built around an incredible inter...

If you’re a fan of football biographies, chances are you’ll have read Ruy Castro’s 2004 biography of Garrincha. It is an astonishing, idiosyncratic tale of a man who overcomes physical disability to win the World Cup and become one of the most iconic Brazilian footballers of all time. It is a bonkers story of a man who lost his virginity to a goat and fathered enough children to fill a football te...

Socrates was one of the most iconic footballers of the 20th century. tall and thin, with a thick black beard and talent to burn, he lit up Brazil at the 1982 and 86 World Cups. But the football was only part of the story - Socrates was also a qualified doctor and political activist who campaigned endlessly for social justice in Brazil. His was a remarkable story and Dr Socrates, Andrew Downie’s bi...

Henry Winter, chief football writer of The Times, talks about the experience of covering major tournaments as a journalist: from the press' relationship with the FA, the players who light up the interview room through to climbing trees in an attempt to glimpse England training sessions Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. This is a public episode. If you would like to discu...

In '50 Years of Hurt', Henry Winter went in search of the answer to the biggest question in English international football: Why have England not won a tournament since 1966? Through interviews with participants from every World Cup, Winter explores themes like tactical conservatism, FA incompetence, press relations and the culture of fear which grips the players. There are shafts of optimism, howe...