Made in Africa: The History of African Players in English Football

Absolutely jam packed full of interesting information, this book is a wonderful, fulfilling read. It tells the stories of some of the early African players in English Football, with the experiences of today’s players then skilfully weaved into the narrativeThe book is well planned and flows well and gives a very good history of the game and of society. The steady growth of African players in the Premier League is backed up by statistics, with match reports used to signal important milestones in football history. Elements of the history of Africa are covered too, such as the section about Naby Keita’s Guinea, “the water tower of Africa”, in an area which had once been the centre of one of the most formidable empires in history. Issues like apartheid in South Africa are mentioned and of course, the distressing story of slavery. We learn a little about Africa’s colonial past which initially dictated the European countries where players went to play due to language and cultural considerations.“Made in Africa” is an optimistic book, presenting many positive rôle models amongst the African born players who have successfully come to England to play football.

A fantastic, lively and insightful book on the history and impact of African footballers in English Football their challenges, disappointments, failures and successes from the early pioneers of Arthur Wharton and Albert Johanssen to Peter Ndlovu, first African to play in premier league, Eni Aluko, most capped England women's player from Africa to current legends and icons Mane, Salah and Aubameyang joint winners of the Golden Boot in 2019, and all the others in between with last count being 300 and rising of African players to grace the premier league. A real coup de grace and a wonderful piece of journalism, hats off Ed Aarons

I stumbled upon this book by accident whilst looking for information about a particular player. It did not disappoint, far from it, some wonderful background information about a lot of players.I felt slightly Liverpool biased by that is understandable when you read the people portrayed.

An in-depth, insightful and very enjoyable read on the history of African players in English football. Plenty of names from memory lane