Bobby Robson is a legend in British football, and his autobiography, Farewell but not Goodbye, is a lively and dramatic picture of a life lived in and for the Beautiful Game. While Robson has been granted almost godlike status in Newcastle and the North East, his career has touched on every aspect of the national sport. The book describes his days as a player for Fulham and West Brom in the 50s and 60s, the 20 England caps he collected over the years and (of course) his spectacularly successful career in management (all 40 years of it); there is no career quite like this in English football. We all know, of course, that sportsmen's autobiographies are customarily written with a little 'hidden assistance', and Paul Hayward's contribution here should not be overlooked. With the latter's subtle help, the opening chapters detailing Robson's childhood and early years in the North-East have a vividness and texture worthy of such writers as John Braine. But most readers will be keen to get to Robson's sporting career, and if they do a little judicious skipping of these early chapters, they can be forgiven. Soon, we're presented with some of the historic sporting achievements which have been part of Robson's stellar career. There is the `Hand of God' story, the ill-starred Paul Gascoigne's emotional breakdowns (which so endeared him to the nation) and the high tension of Robson's squiring the England team through two dramatic World Cups. Too many autobiographies have cheated the reader by drawing a discreet veil over the very things that we most wish to read about - but Robson will have no truck with such mealy-mouthed evasion; for the first time he describes the real story behind his sacking as Newcastle manager in 2004, and his five turbulent years at St James's Park is treated with similar frankness. -Barry Forshaw.

Full Time: the Secret Life of Tony Cascarino is the most praised football autobiography in a very long time. Reviewers' jaws dropped at "the searing honesty. and the breathless style" (The Saturday Times); The Observer Sport Monthly gasped "It's Angela's Ashes with half-time oranges. a footballer's autobiography like no other. The most astonishing sports book of the year. " "Autobiography" of course means ghost-written: though told in the first person it was put together by award-winning Irish journalist Paul Kimmage, whose Rough Ride won the William Hill Sports Book of the Year award in 1990. [+]

When considering the public face of Sir Alex Ferguson-the unsmiling, world-beating football manager who has taken just about all the honours the British game has to offer-it is difficult to imagine that he grew up as the son of a ship builder on the banks of the Clyde in Glasgow. Yet Ferguson's story is much the same as many others who have made it to the top in the sport: a boy with talent who rose above the expectations of his working-class background to become a household name throughout the world. Such is the power of football; but more relevantly, such is the power of raw talent, pure determination and a bit of good luck. In Managing My Life Ferguson tells the story of just how he developed from a football-mad youngster to the first British manager to win the FA Cup, the Premiership and the European Cup in one season; but whereas others with a similar experience romanticise their tough upbringing and eulogise it from the comfortable position success affords them, with Ferguson there is the feeling that the tough, uncompromising way he runs his team is a direct product of values instilled in childhood that he still holds close. I grew up accepting that shipbuilding was part of the fabric of my existence. In a community that reliews heavily on a single industry, there is an intensity of shared experience that draws people together and tends to make them appreciate the need to support one another. It has been said that the values great managers like Jock Stein, Sir Matt Busby, Bill Shankly and Bob Paisley brought to their jobs in football were rooted in their mining background. I have no doubt it is true and I am sure, too, that any success I have had in handling men, and especially in creating a culture of loyalty and commitment in teams I have managed, owes much to my upbringing among the working men of Clydesdale. Opening the book with a word on his recent Treble success (after all, who could be expected to wait until the end of this extraordinary story for all the gory details?), Ferguson soon reveals the big secret of his success-family support. The constants throughout his life have been close friend and family relationships and an absolute passion for winning, and both are constantly recurring themes throughout the book. [+]

Hot on the bleeding heels of Mankind's Have a Nice Day!, here's another memoir edited by the same prose coach, the clever Jeremie Ruby-Strauss (and co-authored by Joe Layden). Dwayne Johnson, aka the Rock, gives you plenty of colourful, jumbled action photos and the growling accounts of staged mayhem that made Mankind a bestseller. But actually, his story is more interesting than that of Mankind, his occasional ring rival. The noisy action chapters alternate with passages of more reflective conventional autobiography. The Rock is a third-generation pro wrestler and his book amounts to a history of the sport. His grandpa, High Chief Peter Maivia, was a Samoan important enough to be buried in Diamond Head's crater, and his dad, Rocky Johnson, was George Foreman's sparring partner and the first black American World Wrestling Federation Intercontinental champ. The Rock is candid about the battles his family faced outside the ring: the marriage-testing road lifestyle, his dad's most important win (over the bottle) and the author's own dangerous temper. There's something touching about the Rock's unpromising debut in his Uncle Tonga's old trunks, in his reverence for his elders-and something scary about his reaction when he thinks people lack such respect. What, you say? You'd rather hear about the Rock's "schmozz" (free-for-all) with Mankind, or Faarooq and the interracial Nation of Domination, or that Budweiser-popping piece of trailer trash Stone Cold Steve Austin, or the Undertaker, whose skin is "the colour of bad meat"? You want to hear how he started out sleeping on a pungent mattress retrieved from a garbage dump and wound up wearing Versace shirts and chatting up Gennifer Flowers on TV at Wrestle Mania XIV? You crave the secrets of the Frankenstein, the Gorilla Position and Jake the Snake? That's all here too. Just hop in the ring-The Rock will show you around. [+]