Search results for ""Author Cass Pennant""

'People didn't talk about the team, they talked about the mob that came with them'Terrifyingly vicious, brilliantly organised, tremendously feared and highly fashionable, the InterCity Firm were the most notorious football hooligan gang the country had ever seen. Bestselling author Cass Pennant was one of the I.C.F.'s best-known figures and has used his unique position as a West Ham insider to bring together these first-hand accounts of the men who were at the eye of storm, both on and off the terraces. In this classic account of football hooliganism at its terrifying height, all the faces of the West Ham firm reveal their memories and thoughts about the violence, the battles, the campaigns, the run-ins with the authorities, and all that came with it. Congratulations, you are just about to meet the I.C.F...

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In his latest book, bestselling author Cass Pennant takes an engaging and unparalleled look at some of the most volatile and violent scenes of fans following their football clubs to have unfolded over the past five decades, and examines the lengths to which many will go to put one over their local rivals.Here is history that also examines everything from the changing face of football violence, to who gets involved - and why. It looks, too, at how the' firms' operate, both home and away, and at the effects of the football establishment's often counter-productive attempts to contain hooliganism on the psychology of supporters. Has the war on hooliganism been successfully stamped out? Can it ever be won? This remarkable and informative book gives a frank examination of football violence to show how different inter-club and inter-regional rivalries have evolved - and features many first-hand accounts of incidents that make chilling reading. It builds up to provide the most comprehensive look behind the match-day madness and the activities of some of British football's most notorious hooligans, to give answers as to why these games are so important to supporters. The history of such infamous 'firms' as the ICF, the Bushwackers, the Headhunters, and the Red Army has never been fully documented . . . until now.You're Going Home in a F*cking Ambulance is an eye-opening study of a problem that refuses to go away, by a writer who knows his subject inside-out.

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He arrived to rally the troops, the main man in the Inter City Firm and his greeting passed into football fan history. 'Afternoon, gentlemen, the name's Bill Gardner.' That introduction alone was often enough to provoke sheer terror in his opponents. He is a genuine legend to anyone who's ever stood proud on a football terrace. No serious book on the culture would be complete without at least one mention of him. And now at last, he's telling his own, long-awaited story. For the first time, Gardner himself reveals what made him the top man, including his innermost thoughts and his memories of the classic years for football fans. And many familiar faces have queued up to add their comments in this book which shows just what it is that makes Bill Gardner unique among the toughest and the greatest of them all.

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In this ground-breaking book, the men behind the mobs come together to reveal their experiences as key figures in the most notorious terrace fights. Bestselling writers Cass Pennant, from West Ham's Inter City Firm (ICF) and Chelsea Head Hunter main man Martin King have joined forces to produce the definitive book on terrace culture. From the bovver boys of the sixties and seventies to the football casuals of the eighties, the names central to the biggest firms have all been tracked down and interviewed, the names that were to become the stuff of which terrace legends are made. Cass Pennant is the bestselling author of Want Some Aggro?; Rolling with the 6.57 Crew; Congratulations, You Have Just Met the ICF and his hugely successful autobiography, Cass. Martin King, left, is the highly acclaimed author of Hoolifan and its bestselling follow-up The Naughty Nineties. He has also written A Boy's Story; On the Cobbles: The Life of a Bare-Knuckle Gypsy Warrior, The Estate; The South Downs Way; Ossie: King of Stamford Bridge and Grass: The Phil Sparrowhawk Story.

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The autobiography of Cass Pennant is packed with amazing stories of a life lived on the edge of the law. In this thrilling book, he tells of how he saved World Boxing Champion Frank Bruno from a potentially vicious attack; how he was shot three times in the chest and still kept on fighting, and how he was alleged to be the leader of the notorious West Ham 'InterCity Firm'.This is the astonishing account of a boy abandoned by his mother and brought up by adoptive parents (who were white) - a boy who triumphed against all the odds.A bestseller on its publication, Cass is also a major film directed by Jon S. Baird, starring Nonso Anozie in the title role, and Oscar-winner Daniel Kaluuya as Young Cass.

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Portsmouth's 6.57 crew were the most talked about casual football firm of the 1980s and 1990s. This notorious gang took their name from the time of the train they caught to games, following their team around the country with the kind of dedication - and violence - that only a true hoolifan knows. Now, for the first time ever, the amazing story of the firm is revealed.

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