Leeds United and a Life in the Press Box - Tapa blanda

Ever wondered what it is like to travel on the team coach of a top football club, mixing with players, managers and directors? John Wray had that privilege for many years as he accompanied Leeds United through their triumphs and tribulations at home and abroad. His sometimes serious, sometimes comical memories of a lifetime in sports journalism offer a fascinating insight into the joys and perils of a job that for most fans remains a mystery. Journalists covering their local club tread a thin line between satisfying readers' insatiable appetite for stories and keeping on the right side of their contacts.Trust is everything. John joined in the players' card schools, travelled with the team to Wembley when Don Revie was in charge and had a big bust-up with Revie's brief successor Brian Clough. He is still covering the club to this day, though he spent similarly happy times reporting on the low-key Bramley Rugby League team. This book will appeal to football fans and fellow journalists alike as it traces a career encompassing everything from editing a football match between pub teams called Toby Jug and Squinting Cat to interviewing Eric Cantona, Howard Wilkinson, Vinnie Jones and a host of other big names.

Born in Bramley, Leeds, in 1946, John Wray has been a journalist all his working life covering Leeds United for over 40 years for local and national newspapers. Wray has established a working relationship with every Leeds United manager from Don Revie to Gary McAllister and for many years travelled on the team coach, forming close friendships with players, managers and directors and falling out with a few along the way, including Brian Clough! Until chairman Ken Bates took the match-day programme in-house John Wray edited it and ghosted columns for many of the managers, captains and chairmen. Since 1990 Wray has been a partner in the long established Gosnay's Sports Agency in Leeds and in 2005 researched and co-wrote the book 'Where Are They Now? - Life After Leeds United', which tracked the whereabouts of players who had turned out for the first team since 1970 and then retired from football.Married to former professional ice-skater Helen Leaman, he has two daughters, Liz and Louise, and two grandsons, Oliver and Harry.