Product Description

The memoirs of the founder of the Celtic Soccer Crew. John O'Kane has 33 criminal convictions, not counting the countless cases dropped or for which he was found not guilty. He was remanded nine times, including once for attempted murder at age 18. He founded the Celtic Soccer Crew in 1984 and it is still active today. They are an unusual crew in that, in O'Kane's time, it included their girlfriends and they had to survive despite the majority of the Celtic fans being against them.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #20811 in Books
• Published on: 2007-05-11
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Customer Reviews

One of the best of its kind
Having read a few of these 'hooligan' books I have to say this is probably the best of its kind.

O'Kane has attempted here to give probably the most honest account of the life of a football hooligan over the years that he can. Obviously some stories can be one sided (how else could they be) but for the most part he is a pretty honest writer.

In fact for most of the book he writes about the numerous times his firm have been turned over by rival firms who have had better numbers, better organisation or are more prepared to use more violence against them than they are prepared to.

He covers the history of the firm and how they started up (even openly saying how they were hated by normal Celtic fans and pointing out one occasion where his firm were escorted out the ground by police to the cheers of Celtic supporters who threw just about everything the could lay their hands on at them, even spitting at them)

Interestingly enough, the author also mentions how many of the firm took part in actively fighting fascism both in Scotland and England acting as stewards for Anti Racist/Fascist marches in England.

The book is also quite a personal account of the authors life, where he grew up, the jail time he has served and the numerous problems he has had with his personal life. In this way I can only think of "Cass" By Cass Pennant which has given an equally honest account of the authors life.

I can only think some of the more negative reviews have been by rival fans who just dislike the book because it is written by a Celtic fan. Pretty pointless really, I mean if you don't like Celtic so much why bother reading the book?

He covers some of the violence at grounds at a level that other books have tried to gloss over. His description of the Leeds 'friendly' game and how many locals who were not even Celtic fans is particularly disturbing (Cant really say Leeds didn't get what they deserved though)

All in all a very good book and highly recommended. No, its not war and peace and you will probably get through it in a day but still worth a read.

Awful, Like the Team.
When buying this book, I thought at last, here we go, something that will enlighten me on the football hooliganism problem up in Sweaty sock land. I kept waiting, & waiting & waiting for something to happen. If this is all the Celtic boys got up to then I do not know what all the fuss was about. A very poor book, like the Team, & every other team up there. Chuckle Chuckle.

Tall tales
Buy this book if you are Celtic, at best they could get a mob on average of 60 and they never got turned over by anyone especially any English firms. I do believe allot of the stories but also allot are through rose tinted glasses, as a lad who has done it all in the 80s I find some of the accounts against Middlesbrough, Blackburn, all London firms hard to believe.