Egy rajongás története, egyben korlenyomat egy már csak nyomokban létező szubkultúráról.
A regény ’91-92-ben íródott, ami választóvíz volt az angol fociban (meg az európaiban is), a Heysel és a Hillsborough-tragédia után nyilvánvaló volt, hogy változtatni kell, új szabályok jöttek, kiszorították a balhés szurkolókat, megszűntek az állólelátók, új stadionok épültek, és az egész elment a családi hétvégi szórakoztatás irányába. A Hornby féle rajongókra, akiknek életformájukká vált a meccsre járás, nem volt többé szükség.
Érzek némi rokonságot Hornbyval, igaz, én egész másfajta drukker voltam, de nekem is kitöltötte a gyerekkoromat a foci. A ’70-es évek végén lettem rajongó, Dózsa drukker, Fazekas-Törőcsik-Fekete csatársor, ma már ilyen nincs, de hát ki emlékszik ma már pl. Tóth Andrásra, aki szintén kiváló játékos volt. Mindezt úgy, hogy száz méterre nőttem fel a Haladás pályától, de a meccsre járás valahogy fel sem vetődött, talán mert apám sem volt meccsre járó ember, nem volt, aki elvigyen, arról meg szó sem lehetett, hogy egyedül menjek ki gyerekként. Életemben nem voltam egyetlen bajnoki meccsen sem, de a körkapcsolás az mindig szólt, emlékszem, moziba mentünk a barátommal, és vittem a kis Philips rádiómat, azon hallgattuk az eredményeket. A falamon meg ott lógott a tabella, papír-excel, ott állítottam hetente a sorrendet. Mi inkább fociztunk, gyakorlatilag minden szabadidőnkben, meg ha lehetett, akkor tornaórán is (középiskolában opció sem volt, abból állt a tornaóra, hogy elkértük a tornatanártól a labdát, óra végén meg visszavittük, ennyit találkoztunk vele).

Hornby nagyon pontos képet fest a focirajongóról, aki így papíron akár szimpatikus is lehet, de rossz elképzelni, milyen lehet együtt élni egy ilyennel. Akinek bárminél fontosabb a meccs, akármilyen meccs, és akármilyen családi eseménynél. Érdemes összevetni Gazdag József könyvével (Egy futballfüggő naplójából), hasonló élmények a magyar ugaron. Emellett persze képet fest úgy általánosságban is a rajongás természetéről, de azt hiszem, ez itt inkább melléktermék, mert valójában egyedül csak a focibuziság infernóját akarta itt megmutatni.

Azért kíváncsi lennék, mit gondol Hornby erről a mostani új világról, mit szólt, amikor az Arsenal lett az első angol csapat, amelyik angol játékos nélkül állt ki egy bajnokira. És hát látjuk, hogy ez az új világ is lassan félmúlt, a szuperligák kora jön, az üzlet dübörög, és hiába kepeszt az UEFA, nem fog tudni gátat szabni a tőkének, legfeljebb majd ők is nagyobb zsebes nadrágot húznak. De nem találtam nyomát Hornby ilyen írásának, talán úgy van vele, hogy azt majd írják meg a közgazdászok.

“Febre de Bola” é um livro de memórias que se norteia pelos jogos do Arsenal ao longo do tempo, fazendo um paralelo entre os resultados esportivos e os sucessos e fracassos da vida pessoal e profissional do autor; sendo, na verdade, bem mais focado nos jogos e em toda experiência que eles envolvem do que nas memórias em si.

Posto isso, na minha opinião esse livro é indicado somente para amantes do futebol, ou melhor dizendo, é contraindicado para quem não gosta desse esporte. Afinal, tirando as lembranças dos gols, da atmosfera das arquibancadas e das vitórias e derrotas marcantes, o livro tem de fato pouco a oferecer.

Nick Hornby, em seu primeiro livro, já apresenta seu estilo de escrita leve e bem-humorado, mas claramente abaixo do que se verifica em “Alta Fidelidade”, já que em algumas oportunidades o autor perde a chance de uma análise mais bem-humorada ou sarcástica. Por outro lado, tive o bônus dele evocar minha memória afetiva de muitos momentos similares que passei como torcedor.

Essa identificação é o fio condutor fundamental para conseguir curtir as quase 250 páginas que, de certa medida, mostram-se repetitivas na descrição de lances dos jogos e, na maioria das vezes, fracassos do Arsenal.

Decepcionou...

I consider myself a fan of football (or whatever you wanna call it). I did not find it interesting or appealing to read the minute details of every match that Arsenal has played in the past 35 years with bits of the narrator's personal trivia shoved in as filler. "Arsenal lost 2-1, this player scored, this player moved to another team, Arsenal lost again, it was cold that day, the score was 1-0, my dad watched with me, I think I sprouted some pubic hair, Arsenal is still in the 2nd division...." If you're not going to read it, I basically summed up the first 150 pages. My least favorite of Nick Hornby's books. It took all I had to get through it.

Being a football (soccer) fanatic myself, and having loved the Colin Firth film, I felt this was a good book for my Book Club Bingo (a sports themed book). If it had been set in more recent years, with people and players I recognized, I think I would have liked it more. It was still relatable to read the author's story of how he came to love Arsenal and how it impacted his life, I just wish I knew who he was talking about most of the time.

In a book filled with resonating passages about football, fandom and the Arsenal, this one stands out:

"One thing I know for sure about being a fan is this: it is not a vicarious pleasure, despite all appearances to the contrary, and those who say that they would rather do than watch are missing the point. Football is a context where watching becomes doing — not in the aerobic sense, because watching a game, smoking your head off while doing so, drinking after it has finished and eating chips on the way home is unlikely to do you a whole lot of Jane Fonda good, in the way that chuffing up and down a pitch is supposed to. But when there is some kind of triumph, the pleasure does not radiate from the players outwards until it reaches the likes of us at the back of the terraces in a pale and diminished form; our fun is not a watery version of the team’s fun, even though they are the ones that get to score the goals and climb the steps at Wembley to meet Princess Diana. The joy we feel on occasions like this is not a celebration of others’ good fortune, but a celebration of our own; and when there is a disastrous defeat the sorrow that engulfs us is, in effect, self-pity, and anyone who wishes to understand how football is consumed must realise this above all things. The players are merely our representatives, chosen by the manager rather than elected by us, but our representatives nonetheless, and sometimes if you look hard you can see the little poles that join them together, and the handles at the side that enable us to move them."

Heavily recommended for anyone who lives and breathes the beautiful game.

This book is about one thing only: the author‘s obsession with Arsenal football club. What impressed me is how much I was able to relive the experiences of a football fan in the 70/80s although I, apart from a bet that Havertz will score 15+ g/a this season, don’t give a flying fuck about that club. I still got those goosebumps everytime he mentioned arsenal, I needed the heimlich, throw that book to the side, yeah. 713. To the 21 yeah. North London is Red. So is my head after laying at the beach all day.

Also, book fits that Prada bag, but can’t give out the 5/5s that easily all the time.

I got this much elusive book from an online store which keeps old books, big thanks to my dear friend who helped me here :-)

This book is a perfect depiction of a fan's obsession with his/her beloved team! It is a real funny autobiography in which the writer's life is measured not in years, but in seasons - not by the Gregorian calendar, but by the Gunners(Arsenal Football Club) fixture list. I've read no better account of what being a fan really means :-)

The best part in the book is the "connection". All fans and supporters of any team or club will identify with every tiny experience and emotion described by Hornby – the lack of control over something we invest so much of ourselves in, the strong sense of belonging with an institution whose fortune and performance makes us sad and happy and bounds us with millions of strangers who are fans just like us!

Este libro habla sobre lo que yo era y lo que, afortunadamente, hace años que ya no soy. Habla de muchas otras cosas, por supuesto, pero en esta lectura he visto reflejada una parte de mí que ya no está conmigo. Es la parte que decía que no a cualquier cosa, a cualquier plan infinitamente mejor que ver otro aburrido e insulso partido de fútbol en Nueva Condomina, porque jugaba el Murcia, y si jugaba el Murcia, había que estar allí.

Hace ya tiempo que me di cuenta de que mi vida no podía estar condicionada por el calendario y los resultados de un equipo de fútbol, y por eso he leído Fiebre en las gradas con una nostalgia teñida también de una cierta superioridad moral. Y quizás nunca llegue a disfrutar de los éxitos de mi equipo con el mismo fervor que Nick Hornby con los del Arsenal (salvando la gran brecha que separa a un equipo que ha ganado la Premier League en trece ocasiones de otro que lleva más de diez años arrastrándose por la tercera categoría del fútbol nacional), pero, al menos, mi mundo no se hundirá cada semana cuando el Murcia vuelva a desaprovechar una ocasión única e irrepetible para colocarse en lo más alto de la liga.

La primera parte de esta historia me fascinó. Está llena del romanticismo con el que los niños vivimos el fútbol cuando descubrimos que hay también un lugar para nosotros en ese mundo de adultos. Está relatada con un gran sentido del humor, pero también con mucha autocrítica, y culmina con el desengaño que, sin embargo, no termina de alejar a Hornby de las gradas.

El resto del libro es la narración de una lucha contra el tedio, la desesperación y la mediocridad, en un paralelismo entre los resultados del Arsenal y la vida del propio autor. En ciertos momentos me ha parecido que abusaba de la justificación y la autoafirmación, pero siempre con conciencia de su propia irracionalidad.

Este fue el primer libro que añadí a mi lista de deseos, en diciembre de 2016. Tardé ocho años en decidir que era el momento de leerlo, pero creo que, de haberlo leído antes, no habría sabido verlo con los mismos ojos.

If you are Football fan, you must read this book. If you are a Sports fan, obsessed with players, statistics and trivia, you must read this book. If you have difficulty explaining to others who can't understand your obsession, then you must make them read this book.
Being an Arsenal fan myself, I had wanted to read Fever Pitch for quite long. Although the book made me realise that I'm not as obsessed about the game or the club as much as Nick Hornby, I was nodding away vigorously when he narrated the emotions a fan feels before a match, during a match and after the match. The humorous touch which he gives to the narration makes it an excellent read. It showed me how I tend to overanalyse and allow my moods to be swayed by Arsenal's fortunes in a season. One takeaway from the book was the history of Arsenal at disappointing it fans in a similar fashion throughout five or more decades. Consistent consistency, as Arsene Wenger would say. Another important insight was on how Nick Horny and other obsessed fans had one common factor - they hated what they were doing and that is why they kept doing it over and over again. They hated the team, the players, the managers, the away fans, their own fans, their own lives; and standing on the terraces to watch the football match and vent all their anger on the team they supported was what they loved. Quite ironical, but I could absolutely make a connect with it.
Apart from Arsenal and football, Nick Hornby has done well to extend the dialogue and provide opinions on plenty of topics associated with society - hooliganism, relationships, money and how it splits society, safety and the role of administration in it.
It feels good to be a fan.

Fever pitch was an autobiographical account of an obsessive Arsenal fan whose happiness, sadness and everything depend on Arsenal’s success or failure.

Most of us, Indian football fans, started watching English football from around 1996. That is the time when ESPN start telecasting one or two matches per weekend. That too most of them were United and Liverpool games. This is why India has lot of fans from these two clubs.

For the guys like me, who started around 2003/04 season, Arsenal was all. The invincible team on a great football ground (First renovated Highbury, then world class Emirates) with great players likes of Henry, Bergkamp, Vieira. We don’t know the past. The period when the dying on the football ground due to hooliganism, wall collapse and lot more reasons.

This book explains a lot about that period which most of us do not know. We always habituated to imagine foreign stadiums are like this from start. No issues of spectator safety and comfort would have ever risen. If you are the person who always complains about quality of Indian stadiums, please read this book. In a country like UK, the stadiums should need more than 100 years to get improved; our stadiums are new and are in the process of improving. It will happen in time, so stop complaining.

The best thing about this book was that this was written in the view of a fan. I could relate to lot of things like planning the outings and parties so that it would not affect him watching the matches, grumbling about the match whenever the team through away the lead and losing, we all do , don’t we?

The main part of the book is the 17 year trophy deficit until they won the league cup on 1987. The irony is now we are in the deficit of 6 years. So I could understand his feelings when he explains the joy he felt when the team won the league.

Also when Hornby explains his feelings after the team lost to Swindon in the cup final, I could relate it with the loss we suffered in the league cup final this year to the relegated Birmingham.
Fever pitch, another great non-fiction book I have read this year. If you are a football fan and following English Football for quite some time, this is a good read irrespective of whichever club you are. This book gives us lot of information that we would not possibly known from the period starting 1968 till 1991. If you are a Gunner’s fan, ‘Man, come on this is a book by one of us’.

No prizes for guessing my rating. :)

Just an okay book which is disappointing from this author. I expected more. There were hints of his usual entertaining writing style and at least having grown up in the same time frame in the UK I did know some of what he was talking about. However his descriptions of his obsession were actually very sad and he came across as a rather shallow and unlikeable individual. I think I would have liked to hear more about his life and less about who kicked which goal at which match whenever. I have to say his memory for all those unnecessary details was bordering on scary! Not his best book in my opinion.

Just a bit of fun about how mad a football fan can be. Perhaps it is simply a mindset that means you are unable to adjust to any other form of life. Tragic? No, why would someone enjoying their life be tragic, its what we all want.

Tristan Shandy in Lawrence Stern's novel of the same name defines a good life as one where a person can find their 'hobby horse', Ie the thing that they can love and allows them to bear the dreadful life we are given. Nick Hornby has that hobby horse and so life is liveable.