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‘Striking . . . extraordinarily ambitious’ JONATHAN WILSON, NEW STATESMAN
‘A compelling account of how football became a force in Latin America with an impact far beyond the pitch, helping forge national identity and fuelling regional rivalries’ INDEPENDENT
¡Golazo! recounts the story of Latin American football: the extravagantly talented players; pistol-toting referees; bloody coup d’états; breathtaking goals; invidious conspiracies; strikers with matinee idol looks and a taste for tango dancers; alcoholism; suicide and some of the most exhilarating teams ever to take the field.
And yet it is gripping social history. Andreas Campomar shows how the sport that started as the eccentric pastime of a few expat cricket players has become a defining force, the architect of national identity and a reflection of the region’s soul.
Including not only the well-known heroes of ‘the beautiful game’, but also the numerous forgotten gems of Latin American football, ¡Golazo! is the extraordinary tale of how football came to define a continent.
‘A compelling account of how football became a force in Latin America with an impact far beyond the pitch, helping forge national identity and fuelling regional rivalries’ INDEPENDENT
¡Golazo! recounts the story of Latin American football: the extravagantly talented players; pistol-toting referees; bloody coup d’états; breathtaking goals; invidious conspiracies; strikers with matinee idol looks and a taste for tango dancers; alcoholism; suicide and some of the most exhilarating teams ever to take the field.
And yet it is gripping social history. Andreas Campomar shows how the sport that started as the eccentric pastime of a few expat cricket players has become a defining force, the architect of national identity and a reflection of the region’s soul.
Including not only the well-known heroes of ‘the beautiful game’, but also the numerous forgotten gems of Latin American football, ¡Golazo! is the extraordinary tale of how football came to define a continent.
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Reviews
Perfection, pride, politics and punch-ups. The South American way of football has never been more readable.
Extraordinarily ambitious.
A compelling account of how football became a force in Latin America with an impact far beyond the pitch, helping forge national identity and fuelling regional rivalries.
Campomar effectively brings out the colour and passion for the game, its evocative language, its artistic power and its sometimes-martial ugliness . . . Fine, scintillating history.
This year's World Cup has inspired a number of notable books, among them ¡Golazo! by Andreas Campomar.
Absorbing and entertaining.
Lively history . . . Perfectly timed.
Gripping social history.
¡Golazo! is a timely, intelligent and entertaining account of the development of football in Latin America . . . this is a readable and incisive history, a "serious" football book . . . the main strength of ¡Golazo! lies in the way its perspective extends to the politics - real and mythologised - that lie beyond the sport.
A fascinating read.
A celebration of this beautiful play and more a chronicle of how sport, politics and culture have intersected and influenced each other across the region.
The best two books I've come across recently on the craze around the World Cup in Brazil from a Latin American viewpoint are in English: Andreas Campomar's Golazo, on how soccer built Latin America in general, and Goldblatt's Futebol Nation, about how Brazilians can't think about anything else, even when they try.
Comprehensive.
[A] sweeping exploration of soccer intersecting with politics, history, economics and culture in forging a continent's passion.
[Campomar] makes this case throughout, always keeping an eye on the global context of the sport. The scale of this book is essentially high level . . . Golazo! is an enlightening, lively work, one that never shortchanges the sport or the nations at its heart.
A splendid history of Latin American football on both the continent and the international stage . . . This is football writing at its very best, epic on the pitch, socially aware off it.
Brilliant . . . [an] excellent study of football.
Recounting the history of the South American game, with all its social and political backdrops, is some task - but Campomar achieves it in style . . . Government coups, gun-touting refs . . . it's all here.