Ever dreamed of owning your boyhood football club? Be careful what you wish for...

Simon Jordan grew up a stone's throw from Crystal Palace Football Club. As a boy he used to break into the Palace ground for a kick-about on the hallowed turf. On leaving school he entered the mobile phone business. By the age of thirty-two, he'd built a company from nothing, sold it for GBP75 million and bought his childhood club. By the age of forty-two Palace was in administration and Jordan had lost nigh on everything.

Be Careful What You Wish For lifts the lid on the owner's story and reveals for the first time how the national game really works. Jordan spares no one, least of all himself, as he takes us inside a world where hopes and aspirations sit alongside greed, self-interest, overpriced players, dodgy transfers and top-level incompetence. He doesn't hold back.

Breathtakingly honest, highly controversial, humorous and full of jaw-dropping anecdotes, Be Careful What You Wish For is far more than a football book. It is a social commentary on the culture of great wealth and ambition; a Shakespearean tragedy that exposes the dark side of chasing a dream. The perfect Christmas gift for all football fans.

'One of the best football books you will ever read' Birmingham Post

An explosive insight into the previously unseen world of football club ownership by one of the game's most-recognisable figures A finalist for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year Shortlisted for the British Sports Book Award for best autobiography

About the Author
Simon Jordan is a serial entrepreneur who made his fortune in the mobile phone industry. He started the Pocket Phone Shop in 1994 expanding it to over 200 outlets by the time of its sale in 2000. In the same year he bought Crystal Palace Football Club, becoming the youngest ever owner of a Football League club. During his ten years in football covering the entire decade of the noughties he became one of the game's most recognisable faces. He is the author of a critically acclaimed series of columns in the Observer, the founder and former owner of the car magazine, Octane, former owner of an award-winning restaurant and bar, and star of a major ITV series, Fortune Millionaire Giveaway. In 2008 he produced and solely funded the critically-lauded British film, Telstar, the story of the legendary record producer and songwriter, Joe Meek, starring Kevin Spacey.

Reviews
If you are a football fan and have not read this book, you are missing out -- John Inverdale
We all love the idea of owning our boyhood club but [Jordan's] memoir strips away the romance in a frequently hilarious, often alarming account * The Times *
No punches pulled * Independent *
A frank and brutal insight into why football and business don't mix -- Theo Paphitis
I couldn't help laughing... He can't half tell a story * Evening Standard *


Awards
Short-listed for British Sports Book Publishing Awards 2013 (UK) and British Sports Book Publishing Awards 2013 (UK).



Book Information
ISBN 9780224091824
Author Simon Jordan
Format Paperback
Page Count 416
Imprint Yellow Jersey Press
Publisher Vintage Publishing
Weight(grams) 315g
Dimensions(mm) 198mm * 131mm * 27mm