Egidius Braun

The Three Lives of the Kaiser

Franz Beckenbauer – known as ‘the Kaiser’ – was Germany's greatest-ever footballer and one of the game's biggest icons of all time, a World Cup winner as player and manager. But what is often described as a blessed life was in fact a rollercoaster ride with stunning highs and bitter lows. He rose to fame at the 1966 World Cup in England, where after West Germany’s final defeat the British press marvelled at the grace of a ‘beaten but proud Prussian officer’. Yet there was nothing Prussian about the Bavarian boy who flouted authority, disregarded rules and viewed the traditional German work ethic with the disdain of someone to whom everything comes naturally. After a glittering early career at Bayern Munich – captaining them to three European Cup victories and pioneering the playmaking libero role in central defence – Beckenbauer made a controversial move to the recently formed New York Cosmos in 1977. Praised as ‘the greatest’ by none other than Muhammad Ali, he gently warded off overtures from Rudolf Nureyev and partied the night away with Mick Jagger and Grace Jones at Studio 54. Back home, though, people often wondered what to make of this most famous German athlete who was so un-German. Beckenbauer’s country had finally learned to love him by the time he managed the national side to World Cup glory in 1990, but allegations of corruption surrounding Germany’s successful bid to host the 2006 World Cup made him a controversial figure all over again. In The Three Lives of the Kaiser, leading football writer Uli Hesse gives us the definitive biography of this truly remarkable legend.

Nothing like it before : the untold stories of the World Cup soccer championships

Sport, Forced Migration and the 'Refugee Crisis'

Drawing on original research, this book looks at what sport can tell us about the social processes, patterns and outcomes of forced migration and the 'refugee crisis'. Adopting a systems theory framework and examining different sport disciplines, performance levels and settings, it represents a significant contribution to our understanding of one of the most urgent social issues facing the modern world. The book explores four key aspects of sport’s intersection with forced migration. Firstly, it looks at how the media covers sport in relation to the 'refugee crisis', specifically coverage of refugee elite athletes. Secondly, it examines the adaptation of sport organisations to the 'refugee crisis', including the culture, programmes and structures that promote or obstruct sport for refugees. Thirdly, the book looks at sport in refugee sites, and how sport can be used as therapy, an escape or empowerment for refugees but also how it can reinforce the divisions between staff and the refugees themselves. Finally, the book looks at how forced migration influences and is influenced by participation in elite sport, by examining the biographies of elite migrant athletes. A richly descriptive, critical and illuminating piece of work, this book is fascinating reading for anybody with an interest in sport, migration, sociology or the relationship between sport and wider society. The Open Access version of this book, available at www. taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license.