The gruesome stories of the hardest, most ruthless rugby players from around the world since World War I. As talented as they were fiery, many were just as lively off the pitch as on it. In our era of citing commissioners, super slow-motion replays and trial by social media, some of their actions are quite hard to believe! Foreword by Nigel Owens.

WINNER OF THE 2010 WILLIAM HILL SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR PRIZE. Brian Moore, or 'Pitbull' as he came to be known during nearly a decade at the heart of the England rugby team's pack, established himself as one of the game's original hard men at a time when rugby was still an amateur sport. Since his retirement, he has earned a reputation as an equally uncompromising commentator, never afraid to tell it as he sees it and lash out at the money men and professionals that have made rugby into such a different beast. Yet, for all his bullishness on and off the pitch, there also appears a more unconventional, complicated side to the man. A solicitor by trade, Moore's love of fine wine, career experience as a manicurist and preference for reading Shakespeare in the dressing room before games, mark him out as anything but the stereotypical rugby player and in Beware of the Dog Moore lays open with astounding frankness the shocking events, both personal and professional, that have gone towards shaping him over the years. Presenting an unparalleled insight into the mind of one of British rugby's greatest players and characters, Beware of the Dog is a uniquely engaging and upfront sporting memoir, and a deserved winner of the William Hill Sports Book of the Year prize.

Drawing on the collective knowledge of experienced players and coaches, this book prepares rugby players to withstand the rigours of the sport. It helps identify strengths and weaknesses and goes on to game strategy and improving the team's mental focus.

When the going gets tough, the tough get tougher. The ranks of rugby league around the world have been liberally peppered with hardmen. With violence that would never be tolerated off the footy field, the game has always been rough, tough and dangerous. Stiff-arm tackles, headbutts, spear tackles - all aimed at maiming the opposition players - were once just part of the game. But while the thuggery of old has been cleaned up, the modern game of huge hits at breakneck speed is definitely no place for the faint-hearted. Fans in pubs and clubs have always talked about the courage of their favourite sons - men who never took a backward step, like legendary South Sydney captain John Sattler, who played through the 1970 Premiership grand final with his jaw broken in three places, and 'Bumper' Farrell, who was accused of biting off the ear of an opponent as he simultaneously gouged his eyes. In more recent times Andrew Johns orchestrated Newcastle's 1997 grand final success with a punctured lung and three broken ribs, and pint-sized Gold Coast star Preston Campbell picked up a broken jaw early in the game but hid it from team-mates until the final whistle. But Hardmen is much more than a collection of bone-crunching collisions and wild confrontations. As Malcolm Andrews' vivid profiles of the most courageous and colourful dramatically unfold - from those who played on with broken legs in early times to the fast and furious high impact of today - we see both the fascinating evolution of the game and the fiercely resolute qualities that have steadfastly remained at its heart. Simply put, Hardmen captures the unique spirit of rugby league with the greatest collection of ripping yarns ever published in a single volume. I always enjoyed the game more when there was a body or two lying about. It made my job a bit more interesting. - Vince Karalius It was a real bloodbath. John O'Neill got 16 stitches in one of his shins. It was huge gaping wound with blood everywhere. But he still couldn't keep the grin off his face. Father John Cootes

This book looks at 20 rugby union players who fought on wel pitches for little but pride and honour in the days prior to the game turning professional in 1995, such as Dai Morris, Graham Price, Ray Prosser, Brian Thomas, Delme Thomas, Geoff Wheel, J P R Williams, R H Williams, W O Williams and Bobby Windsor.

If all sports are really about war, then rugby is a heart-thumping epic of bayonet charges and hand-to-hand fighting. In Memoirs of a Rugby-Playing Man, bestselling author Jay Atkinson describes his thirty-five year odyssey in the sport-from his rough and rowdy days at the University of Florida, through the intrigue of various foreign tours, club championships, and all star selections, up to his current stint with the freewheeling Vandals Rugby Club out of Los Angeles. Jay has played in more than 500 matches, for which he's suffered three broken ribs, a detached retina, a fractured cheekbone and orbital bone, four deadened teeth, and a dislocated ankle. Written in the style of Siegried Sassoon's Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man, Atkinson's book explains why it was all worth it--the sum total of his violent adventures, and the valuable insights he has gained from them.

Updated edition of the #1 Amazon Bestseller LONGLISTED FOR THE WILLIAM HILL SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEAR PRIZE 2020 Sports books tend to detail extraordinary achievements, triumphs against the odds or commemorate World Cup winning captains. This book does not do that. For many, playing professional sport is the Dream Job. Few manage it, very few make it to the top and for the rest, life is very different. This is their story. In Fringes, Ben Mercer invites you to witness life at the outer edges of professional rugby. This is a first hand account of what life is like as a journeyman professional athlete. You play, but to the wider public you don't exist. You earn but you don't drive a flash car. You sometimes pack out a stadium but sometimes, you play in a deserted park. This is the story for the majority of sports professionals. Only the minority taste the top, only one person gets to lift the cup or win the medal, only 15 get to play for England at any one time. For the rest, that’s not the case. Ben Mercer is a former professional rugby player who after becoming disillusioned and uninspired plying his trade in the English Second Division, accepted an offer out of the blue to go to France and do something different - help an amateur team turn professional. This is a first hand account of what life is like in the lower reaches of professional sport - where your employment status is as precarious as your health and barely anyone will know your name. It's about how it feels to live year to year, with teammates constantly on the move. It's about how professionalism irreversibly changes the French club Stade Rouennais as they move up the divisions, about the tension between progress and identity in a rugby team. It's also about how it feels to actually be out there on the field, how it feels to occasionally do something extraordinary and how it feels when this is no longer enough for you to make the sacrifices that you need to make to keep playing. There's no ghostwriting, it's an unmitigated meditation on how it feels and what it means to play rugby for a living, to dedicate yourself to an uncompromising but occasionally beautiful game. If you've wanted to know what life is really like as a professional athlete, on the Fringes, away from the glitz and glamour of the international game then look no further.