The Man With Maradona's Shirt

This is not a straightforward autobiography, it's a snapshot of a vanished era of football, based on meticulously kept diaries. The eighties and the early nineties was the last era of (relative) innoncence in football. Steve Hodge played alongside Hoddle, Waddle and Ardiles in the lauded mid-eighties Spurs midfield; he was a dressing-room witness to the vagaries, charm, whims and downright venomous side of Brian Clough; he was at two World Cups, being instrumental in the hand-of-God episode, and hanging out with the likes of Gazza and Lineker four years later in Italy. He won the last League Championship medal with Leeds, then languished in the reserves with a 'somewhat shy', cultured Frenchman. As the balls would fly over the midfield -- Howard Wilkinson being a disciple of route one -- Eric Cantona would turn to him and repeatedly say, 'Hodgey, why are we here?' This will be a great, intimate behind-the-scenes glimpse at life at the top level - a kind of blend of the elements that made Pete Davis' All Played Out and Tony Cascarino's Full Time so successful.