The Winning Way - Anita Bhogle & Harsha Bhogle

Learnings from Sport for Managers

What do sporting champions do, what makes winning teams, who is a good leader, why do only some teams keep winning while others win only for a while and then lose… 
Contrary to popular perception, ability is not a major distinguishing factor in success, especially as the level of competition increases. 
But if you combine your ability with the right attitude and the passion to excel, you too can become the best you can be. 
That is the universal formula for winning that this book explores.

The authors - Harsha Bhogle,  a sports commentator and writer, and Anita Bhogle, an Advertising and communication consultant, have previously conducted a series of motivational workshops for many corporates.
This book is a collation of their learnings during these workshops. 
A great read, this book helps you to delve into the world of sports and you discover that the road to success is paved by the same bricks, irrespective of the field one is hoping to succeed in. 
The basic ability to succeed is within each one of us. 
But combining this ability with the right attitude, a thirst to excel, and an unceasing passion make a world of a difference.
In The Winning Way: Learnings From Sport For Managers, the authors cite several examples from the sports world, each example leaves the reader with lingering afterthoughts, inspiration, and a valuable lesson. 
This book may be offhandedly perceived as yet another ‘Guideline to success 101’ lesson, but the uniqueness of the book lies in the fact that all these ‘guidelines’ have been explained through a sports viewpoint, making it far more engaging.
If you are one of those people who gain motivation through the relentless triumphs of sportsmen and sportswomen, this book will reveal the secret behind their formulas of success. 
Although the target audience of this book is primarily corporate managers, this is a great book about leadership and consistency and can be enjoyed by just about anyone due to its easy, yet captivating flow. 
Harsha’s vast knowledge of sports, coupled with Anita’s experience in the corporate world has helped them work through this book with expert ease.

(Book Description Source: Amazon.com and Flipkart.com)

My Comments:
The last chapter of this book "What it Means to be a Team Player" is by Rahul Dravid, the epitome of sportsman spirit in cricket in recent years.
On the whole this book is a very light, interesting and insightful read.
It will appeal to both business and sports persons.
Anyone who is part of a team should read this !

Goodreads Rating - 3.48 out of 5 ( 459 Ratings)

 
 
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Can We Have Our Balls Back, Please? - Julian Norridge

Synopsis  
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"Can We Have Our Balls Back, Please?" is the highly entertaining story of how the British invented sport as we know it today (and then almost forgot how to play it.)

Long before Drake refused to interrupt his game of bowls when the Armada was sighted, the British have had a passionate relationship with sport. 
Julian Norridge goes through the stories of fourteen major sports from cricket to boxing to football, from their very beginning and throughout the British Isles, whether it's Welsh inventor and tobacco enthusiast Major Walter Clopton Wingfield coming up with a game that could use those new fangled rubber balls (modern tennis) or the Scots inventing the golf club - 500 years after the game.
But this is far more than a book about sport, it takes a very funny, very British look at our popular history, mythology and most importantly the highly eccentric figures that made it.
It chronicles the constant battle between fair play and gambling; between advances in the game and plain cheating (such as turning up with a cricket bat wider than the wicket).
Can We Have Our Balls Back Please? proves that there is an awful lot to be proud of in our (British) history and where that strange feeling of superiority really comes from. It shows why we (Britishers) get just so excited when we take on any other nation in any sporting event and are so disappointed when we lose...
[Source: Inner jacket cover of the book ]

 My Comments
A very informative and entertaining read.
Recommended for all sports lovers.


Book Excerpts
Table of Contents, Introduction, Chapter 1- Boxing.



Reviews 

• The Guardian Review 

• Telegraph Review

• Goodreads Rating - 3.25 out of 5 ( 4 Ratings)

 
 

Captain Cool: The M.S. Dhoni Story

Author:        Gulu Ezekiel
Published:     2008
Publisher:     Westland Limited
Paperback:  128 Pages
Readers in India:



While I write this, the performance of the Indian cricket team captained by M.S. Dhoni (the subject of this book) is  not too impressive in this World Cup (though they have reached the quarter-finals).
And same applies to this book. The author is supposed to be one of the best-known sports  journalist. Maybe he should have stuck to it instead of trying his hand in writing books especially a biography. 
A good biography  should paint a very interesting and realistic picture of its subject. You must really get to know the person whose life is being described.
However this book has a feel of some newspaper reports of the  matches involving Dhoni loosely stitched together. We really don't get to know Dhoni as a person.
This is one book which I will not recommend to anybody except may be to die-hard  Dhoni fans, who may lap it up. 
Ignore the Buy Buttons in this post ! I just retained them to maintain the consistency of my blog posts !
Actually I ordered this book from India Plaza recently  when they offered it for just Rs. 1 as a special World Cup offer.  Maybe they wanted to get rid of the huge inventory of this book which hardly anyone would have bought otherwise.  

Michael Schumacher : Driven to Extremes

Author : James Allen
Published: 2000
Publisher: Bantam Books

When I started watching Formula 1 Car Racing in 2002, Michael Schumacher and the Ferrari team were reigning supreme. This book describes the races of 1998 & 1999 season when they were yet to dominate the scene. In fact they were struggling hard to win the Grand Prix championships amidst lot of controversies surrounding Schumacher's unsportsmanlike behavior on the track and suspicions of Ferrari indulging in illegal tampering of their cars. They came very close to winning in these two seasons.
Though not a complete biography of Schumacher, it does have a chapter on his early racing career and also a chapter describing his driving techniques and his mental framework while he is at his job. I came to know a couple of facts about him - one he comes from not a very well to do family, his father being a brick layer and his mother a petty shop keeper; another he had an physical fitness trainer who was an Indian viz; Balbir Singh !
The book also deals at some length on how the other architects of Ferrari Grand Prix victories - Jean Todt and Ross Brawn transformed Ferrari from a struggler to a dominant force which steamrolled their competetitors for the next 5 years till 2004.
Written by James Allen a well known F1 commentator, this book is very enjoyable , almost like an action thriller. But to get the maximum thrills you need to be a F1 fan and preferably should not be aware of what happened during 1998, 1999 seasons. I picked up this book from a second-hand book shop and I am glad I did that.