In The Great & the Good Irelands leading football pundit & legend of the game John Giles looks back on more than fifty years of football at developments in the game from the post-War period to the present day the great players who drove it forward the visionary managers & their teams & the age-old question of what makes a player good & what makes one great. From his earliest days John Giles can recall pondering the subject. Youd hear about certain great" players such as Stanley Matthews but no one would ever explain why they were great. & its a thing that has always frustrated me: trying to define what makes a player great & what separates the great from the good. Now the man himself brings us the answers & celebrates the great ones from Stanley Matthews Tom Finney Dave Mackay John Charles Johnny Haynes & Jimmy Greaves to Pele Franz Beckenbauer John Robertson Diego Maradona Marco van Basten Lionel Messi Paul Scholes & many more. It will include a section on Irish players including detailed analysis of such greats as Roy Keane Liam Brady & Paul Mc Grath. & finally Giles names the player he considers the greatest of them all."