Having enjoyed Duncan Alexander's droll nerdism on various football podcasts, I thought I'd have a crack at his book. The verdict is roundly positive, though it should really be called Outside the Box: A Statistical Journey through the History of Football (mainly in the Premier League). This isn't really a complaint as I'm most familiar with said league but I could have done with a bit more on the other main European leagues, not to mention other world football. Perhaps this is something for the other Optas to cover (OptaJose, OptaPaolo, etc), leaving the UK to OptaJoe.
There are chapters on Liverpool's failings :), Arsene Wenger's legacy (timely), Messi's brilliance, the World Cup in data, as well as a summary of every season of the Premier League. 'The Forgotten Men and Deeds of the Premier League' is a highlight with names like Branko Strupar (highest scoring player NEVER to assist a goal), Alan Kimble (most assists without scoring himself) and Radhi Jaidi (61 games and never played in a goal-less draw). Loads of geeky goodness here.
Obviously, there's too much information here to mention much more but Alexander has spruced up the data and made it more accessible and this is no mean feat for a book about statistics. Well worth a gander, folks.
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