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The Mixer: The Story of Premier League Tactics, from Route One to False Nines

Michael Cox

4.43 · Rating details · 1,741 ratings · 144 reviews

An absolutely essential book for every modern football fan, about the development of Premier League tactics, published to coincide with 25 years of the competition.

Back in 1992, English football was stuck in the dark ages, emerging from a five-year ban from European competition. The game was physical, bruising and attritional, based on strength over speed, aggression over

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Kindle Edition, 496 pages

Published June 1st 2017 by HarperCollins

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Oct 20, 2017 Bernard O'Leary rated it it was amazing

Oh god, what a joyous, near-pornographic treat for football nerds.

The Mixer really is just 400 pages about things like the difference between 4-3-3 and 4-2-3-1, and why inverted wingers can lead to midfield congestion. By rights, this book should be quite boring.

Cox makes it interesting by spinning the whole thing into a narrative that's gripping all the way through. The basic plot is that post-Heysel British football decided in 1992 to reinvent itself, with money from Rupert Murdoch and driven Oh god, what a joyous, near-pornographic treat for football nerds.

The Mixer really is just 400 pages about things like the difference between 4-3-3 and 4-2-3-1, and why inverted wingers can lead to midfield congestion. By rights, this book should be quite boring.

Cox makes it interesting by spinning the whole thing into a narrative that's gripping all the way through. The basic plot is that post-Heysel British football decided in 1992 to reinvent itself, with money from Rupert Murdoch and driven by the greatest manager in the history of British football, Alex Ferguson.

Football back in '92 was all about strength and passion. Nobody wanted to overthink the game, not the fans, not the media, and certainly not the players, who were still showing up to training sessions with hangovers. The last thing anyone wanted to do was to import fancy ideas like "tactics" from Europe. None of those short, clever passes, no building from the back, just stick it in the fahkin mixer.

Ferguson, who really is the most important figure in the history of English football, had other ideas and started to introduce new concepts, like getting Eric Cantona to play between the lines in a number 10 role (something that was decidedly foreign in the early 90s). Eventually, Number 10s became standard, with other teams bringing in players like Zola and Bergkamp, and the game became subtly more Europeanised.

Ferguson really is the heart of the whole story, the wiley old git constantly finding new ways to reinvent his team, and the rest of the league scrambling to keep up. After winning the treble with a very traditional 4-4-2, he experimented with 4-5-1, 4-3-3, inverted wingers, false 9s and basically whatever tactic that had recently defeated him in Europe.

He himself was locked in a kind of Sisyphusean tragedy, where he is utterly dominant at home but always a step behind the innovators of Europe. He won two Champions Leagues, sure, but both by the skin of his teeth. United never dominated a final, never absolutely battered their opponent, never proved Ferguson to be Europe's greatest tactician.

But he did keep trying, and his mad experiments forced the other teams in the league to adapt or get relegated. Game by game, the Premier league learned to stop lumping long balls up to a target man, and learned how to play football.

United's endless revolution dominated the Premiership until he retired, so almost every other team is relegated to a subplot in this book, but there are some crackers: a ruthless post-mortem of Keegan's Newcastle failure, the many moods of Brendan Rogers, the rise and fall of Pulisball, how Ruud Gullit failed to convince anyone that his ideal role was centre back, and why Makelele is the most important player of this century.

The Mixer connects all of these plots, making them all seem like a logical consequence of what went before. It adds up to single, epic story, spanning 25 years, 47 teams, 10,000 games, 25,000 goals, epic tactical battles, wet windy nights in Stoke, and the possibility this might finally be Liverpool's year.

By rights, the story should taper off with Ferg's retirement, but that was only the prelude to the maddest event in the history of all sport, Leicester's 2016 title win. Football. Bloody hell. ...more

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Jun 20, 2017 Ben Cullimore rated it really liked it

Michael Cox, founder of the Zonal Marking website and frequent contributor to the Guardian, has in recent years become the go-to guy for tactical analysis. His intelligent and accessible writing deserves to be commended for the role it has played in improving the standard of football punditry in Britain, helping to move it away from vacuous, hyperbole-laden sensationalism and towards a more in-depth and technical approach. Alongside Jonathan Wilson - arguably the country's finest football writer Michael Cox, founder of the Zonal Marking website and frequent contributor to the Guardian, has in recent years become the go-to guy for tactical analysis. His intelligent and accessible writing deserves to be commended for the role it has played in improving the standard of football punditry in Britain, helping to move it away from vacuous, hyperbole-laden sensationalism and towards a more in-depth and technical approach. Alongside Jonathan Wilson - arguably the country's finest football writer - Cox has helped to bring tactical analysis to the masses.

Unsurprisingly, The Mixer: The Story of Premier League Tactics, from Route One to False Nines, his first full-length book, does not disappoint. Cox guides the reader through the history of the English top tier and charts the important tactical revolutions that helped create one of the most entertaining and fascinating leagues in the world. He - correctly, in my view - links each change in tactical outlook to the increasing influx of foreign players and managers, highlighting the ways in which new ideas and methods emerged with each passing year. This was particularly the case in the 1990s, when the arrival of Eric Cantona, Dennis Bergkamp, Gianfranco Zola and Arsène Wenger helped to move Premier League football away from the "route one" tactics of the 1970s and 1980s and towards a more sophisticated, "continental" variety.

Reading The Mixer: The Story of Premier League Tactics, from Route One to False Nines, one is struck by just how tactically diverse the 2000s were. Arsène Wenger revolutionised English football upon his arrival, but Cox rightly dedicates significant sections of his book to the important contributions made by José Mourinho and Rafael Benítez. He also pays close attention to those further down the table ("traditionalists" like Sam Allardyce and Tony Pulis, for example), whilst describing how waves of what can be described as "consensus football" took hold of the Premier League due to the tactical ideas utilised by the leading managers of the time. The current widespread use of a three-man defence, as was evident last season, illustrates that point perfectly.

Whilst not quite as tactically in-depth as Inverting the Pyramid: The History of Football Tactics - which arguably remains the best football book ever written - The Mixer: The Story of Premier League Tactics, from Route One to False Nines is an offering so brilliant and fascinating that it deserves to be read by anyone with an interest in the Premier League. ...more

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Nov 22, 2017 Gumble's Yard rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2017

Michael Cox is the author of the football tactics website Zonal Marking

http://www.zonalmarking.net/

and a freelance football journalist, particularly featured in the Guardian.

https://www.theguardian.com/profile/m...

This book is effectively a tactical history of the UK Premier League, based presumably on his years of analysis for his website supplemented by many hours of re-watching of past matches, and also (from the index) based on scouring footballer’s (auto)biographies and contemporary ...more

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Feb 19, 2018 Joe O'Donnell rated it it was ok

Shelves: sports, european-football, football, football-history, sports-psychology, england, football-tactics, english-football, premier-league, english-premier-league

"The Mixer" is billed as a tactical history of the English Premier League explaining - across 25 years in 25 chapters - how English football evolved from being traditionally backward and inward-looking to become the most international and tactically-advanced league in the world. It takes 1992 as it's starting point - a year significant not so much for the formation of the Premier League, but for the introduction of the law banning the backpass to the goalkeeper (leading to a greater emphasis on "The Mixer" is billed as a tactical history of the English Premier League explaining - across 25 years in 25 chapters - how English football evolved from being traditionally backward and inward-looking to become the most international and tactically-advanced league in the world. It takes 1992 as it's starting point - a year significant not so much for the formation of the Premier League, but for the introduction of the law banning the backpass to the goalkeeper (leading to a greater emphasis on a short-passing game instead of 'route one' long ball).

But, "The Mixer" is a book which isn’t quite sure what it wants to be; it falls between two stools of being an analysis of the evolution of English football tactics, or a potted history of the English Premier League, and fails to deliver on either of those objectives entirely satisfactorily.

The success of Jonathan Wilson's books like "Inverting the Pyramid" and "Behind the Curtain" show there is an appetite - and market - for books on how football tactics have developed. The problem in this case is that the first 10 years of the Premier League involved little tactical innovation, making “The Mixer” a curiously lopsided book.

So, the first half of "The Mixer" ends up as a fairly dry recitation of the key matches and pivotal transfer signings of the English Premier League in the 1990s, little of which will be hugely revelatory to anybody with a passing interest in football during that era. Rather than any great tactical insight, the early chapters of "The Mixer" cover well-trodden ground like how Arsene Wenger and Dennis Bergkamp revolutionised] Arsenal, the midfield battles between Patrick Viera and Roy Keane in the 2000s, and Alex Ferguson's attempts to move Manchester United to a more defensive, 'European' approach. All of this is relatively recent history - and as the English Premier League does not want for lack of exposure - little of it will be new for most football fans.

The latter parts of "The Mixer" are better, and there are a few interesting sections in the second part of the book analysing Tony Pulis and his use of long throw-ins at Stoke City, and the growing popularity of 'inverted wingers' like Gareth Bale. There is even a chapter giving a fairly clear explanation as to what a ‘false number nine’ might be.

Yet, it is hard to work out who the audience might be for "The Mixer". Fans with an interest in football data analytics are better off reading "Soccernomics" by Kuper & Syzmanski; tactical anoraks should check out the aforementioned titles by Jonathan Wilson. "The Mixer" is well-researched and competently written, but it is surprisingly found wanting when it comes to depth of analysis.
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Nov 11, 2018 Jarvo rated it liked it

I thought that this was a bit like watching 25 years of MOTD highlights, including some fairly standard football punditry. You get to see some fabulous players, the big teams (a lot) and have the illusion of being better informed. Its enjoyable, but how in depth is it?
I had a seed of doubt in the opening pages when the author is making some disparaging comments about long ball football, and the fabled 'position of maximum opportunity'. Now I'm no fan of the theories of Wing Commander Hughes and ...more

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Aug 01, 2017 Niels rated it it was amazing

Shelves: football

It would be challenging to find a 470-page book describing football tactics, concepts, people (some of whom you've never heard) and their actions on field, and keep you hooked to the last page. Michael Cox's The Mixer effectively does that. There's a perfect blend here of an engaging writing style, whilst describing and analyzing that particular football issue the average fan and lover doesn't know (or care) about: tactics. From the abolishing of the back-pass to the keeper in 1990, to Antonio It would be challenging to find a 470-page book describing football tactics, concepts, people (some of whom you've never heard) and their actions on field, and keep you hooked to the last page. Michael Cox's The Mixer effectively does that. There's a perfect blend here of an engaging writing style, whilst describing and analyzing that particular football issue the average fan and lover doesn't know (or care) about: tactics. From the abolishing of the back-pass to the keeper in 1990, to Antonio Conte's popular introduction of 3-man defences in England, and - maybe even more astonishingly as we will find out - the crushing of the EPL by Guardiola's system with inverted wingbacks. Football tactics have underwent extraordinary changes throughout the years (driven by players and coaches alike) always trying to counter-act some dominant features of contemporary play. So it is not only a great book to read, but also very instructive to think about game plans yourself.

In that respect, it is astonishing to find out that in one of the biggest leagues of Europe, tactics (and tactical managers) were considered a lesser part of the game (in favor of man-managing the best players) up until the mid-2000's. For me, this is further evidence of the large black hole that is gaping below the Premier League, and especially in other countries (barring the top flights in Europe). What "niche" is there, I wonder, in terms of tactically intelligent coaches to take (smaller) countries' top leagues by storm?

Writing this as a frequent viewer of Belgian football, for example, it is increasingly unsurprising to see the best performing teams adapting - often as the only ones - concepts from other top leagues. For example, AA Gent's title campaign in 14/15 (never having won the league before) came with the introduction of a splendid 3-4-2-1 system (with great link-up play between a large centre forward, wide-drifting attacking midfielders, and hard-working wingbacks), taking every flatbacked 4-4-2 or 4-2-3-1 in the Belgian league by storm. They eventually reached the last 16 of the Champions League, being defeated 4-2 on aggregate by Wolfsburg. The year after, Club Bruges was most succesful in 'cracking the code' by (collectively) pressing extremely high on Gent's back-line, eventually overtaking them as champions. With a spare year in between, Club Bruges is again 11 points clear with a fluid 3-5-2 system utilizing a high press, and sometimes even counter-pressing concepts.

While Cox's theme is all about the mixing up of traditional English football with foreign revolutionaries and concepts, the book in itself is therefore further evidence of this spreading of tactical thinking towards a larger audience - including its impact on existing club's philosophies and ways of doing things instinctively. Not long now until even minnow European leagues will take a further step towards analysis, data and tactics, and steer away from managers who aren't tactically astute. Just as with footballers then, coaches will have to become universalists as well. I probably speak for lots of people, when arguing this won't come a minute too soon. ...more

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May 05, 2018 Stephen rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Not just tactics but descriptions of all the league winning teams, key players and managers and who didn't get on with whom.

A must read for every football fan !

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Aug 11, 2018 Andrewh rated it really liked it

Surprisingly, given the nerdy topic, I found this a really 'good read', although the author is no Brian Glanville stylistically. The conceit of the book is to examine the winners of the PL and see what tactical evolution each team brought to the table - although the writer notes early on that the key tactical innovation of the entire PL concept was to abolish the back pass, which then created the need for ball-playing defenders and, in time, sweeper-goalkeepers - hard to believe now that in the Surprisingly, given the nerdy topic, I found this a really 'good read', although the author is no Brian Glanville stylistically. The conceit of the book is to examine the winners of the PL and see what tactical evolution each team brought to the table - although the writer notes early on that the key tactical innovation of the entire PL concept was to abolish the back pass, which then created the need for ball-playing defenders and, in time, sweeper-goalkeepers - hard to believe now that in the old days, teams could simply keep passing it back to the keeper to stifle a game.

The main argument throughout the book is the unsurprising one that foreign teams/players/managers have been the biggest influence on PL tactical evolution. He goes as far as to say that there have been only two native-born 'revolutionaries' in that era - Rio Ferdinand and, er, Brendan Rodgers. The early parts of the book remind us that in the early days of the PL, teams still played good old 4-4-2, with big lumps at the back and big lads up front, battling it out in the 'air', with the midfielders main job being to win the ball and send it out to the flanks asap (ah, those great days). This was disrupted by the influence of such great European players as Cantona, Zola and Bergkamp (definitely the best player I have ever seen in the PL). Given the early dominance of Man Utd, who played fairly 'British' football for the most part, it took some time before the real tactical evolution set in - coming with the appearance of Arsene Wenger and the need for Ferguson to avoid being defeated in each European Cup tilt. The appearance of Mourinho and other foreign managers over time, as the PL money well deepened, hastened this evolution along, with each innovation spurring a counter-tactic. This is all quite interesting but the best parts of the book for me were the anecdotes, about games or inviduals, and slightly OT chapters (such as on the Tony Pulis era at Stoke, when he innovated the 40-yard flat throw-in, by Rory Delap, as a way of disrupting defences). In the end, successful tactics require intelligent, highly trained players with so-called 'quality' and that also requires large amounts of money - Swansea used to play very nice football but were never going to win the PL. The book ends with the great Leicester win in 2016, which the author explains in tactical terms but which was also, he notes, quite likely due to the transitional stages of the big clubs (and the referees' lenience on their defenders). In 2017, the standard oligopoly was restored, and a new period of tactical dominance is likely to set in, until Pep gets bored again.

p.s. In the book's postscript, the author says that the only English thing about the PL is that it is played in England (and Wales), and that in future, it could also be played in other countries, like the NFL is. The geographical factor is probably the main reason for its runaway success though - without the crowds, tribal rivalries and traditions (including that of direct play), would the PL be as popular on Sky, and therefore be as rich and be able to attract the best foreign talent? . ...more

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Feb 27, 2018 Lol Scragg rated it really liked it

Like to think of myself as reasonably knowledgable about football even though I was a bad player, support a suffering Premiership 'giant' and have a season ticket for a lower league Scottish club, but this book gave me a fascinating insight into the tactical changes seen during my lifetime. I'd never really thought about tactics before but reading it made the things I missed seem obvious. I'm still not going to be up to Michael Owen levels of punditry, but I now have a better idea why ...more

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Dec 03, 2017 Siddharth rated it it was amazing

I've been a fan of Michael Cox since I started following his Zonal Marking site. Over the years he has progressed from a niche tactical analyst to a journalist who is able to simplify football tactics for the lay person. I couldn't think of a better person to write this book and it is by far the best football book I have read in a long time. Every chapter is to be savored. There are trends that he points out in the early years of the Premier League that you wouldn't even think of but make so ...more

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Jul 17, 2018 Vishrut Garg rated it really liked it

Shelves: football, non-fiction

Fantastic book detailing the tactical journey of the Premier League from 1992 till 2017, when Chelsea won with Antonio Conte. The only reason I'm not giving it the full 5 stars is that sometimes the book segwayed into history and the drama of the league at the time, while hashing over the tactical revolutions in play. This undeniably made the book exciting, since I have been a regular spectator of the EPL since 2007/08, and remember about 10 years of those anecdotes, and have read about the ...more

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Oct 30, 2019 Nopadol Rompho rated it it was amazing

Shelves: sports

If you love football, especially English premier league, I think that this is one the best books you should read. It tells also tactics teams use during 25-year of EPL history. It also had some very interesting opinions and observations.

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Oct 06, 2019 Kamila rated it really liked it

Shelves: non-fiction, uk, translations

This book made me feel nostalgic... And I learned so much about tactics! Every football fan should read it, it's a gem.

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Jun 02, 2019 Nv rated it really liked it

The ultimate example came in the dying seconds of Rangers’ European Cup first round tie against Dynamo Kiev in 1987. With Rangers 2-1 ahead on aggregate and building an attacking move, midfielder Graeme Souness received the ball midway inside the opposition half, immediately turned towards his own goal and thumped a 70-yard backward ball to his goalkeeper Chris Woods. Souness, incidentally, would later suffer from the back-pass change more than most.

Cantona was unlike anything England had ...more

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May 20, 2018 Gerard Noipann rated it it was amazing

A must read if you are a football enthusiast.

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Jul 03, 2017 Vinay Badri rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2017-read, sports

A fabulous book, a must read for Premier League fans and also for those with even a passing interest in football

Having spent enough time reading through stuff on Zonal Marking, its no surprise that the same level of insightful analysis is applied here at a broader level rather than at an individual game level and the themes work out pretty well

There is a lot of history, a lot of past matches and a whole lot of fond memories of games and this is truly a fantastic read

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Jun 12, 2017 Tom Wåkkéførd rated it it was amazing

Fun trip back through Premier League history.

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Sep 11, 2017 Nigel Kotani rated it really liked it

This book is ostensibly the story of Premier League tactics, but it would be far more accurate to describe it as a history (with my use of the indefinite article being deliberate) of the Premier League with a particular emphasis on its tactical development.

Amazingly for a book focused on football tactics the author manages to pull it off without it becoming turgid, without it becoming obscure and, most impressively of all, without having to resort to the use of diagrams. That might make it a This book is ostensibly the story of Premier League tactics, but it would be far more accurate to describe it as a history (with my use of the indefinite article being deliberate) of the Premier League with a particular emphasis on its tactical development.

Amazingly for a book focused on football tactics the author manages to pull it off without it becoming turgid, without it becoming obscure and, most impressively of all, without having to resort to the use of diagrams. That might make it a little superficial or trivial to the more technically-minded fan, but it makes it perfect for most.

By way of example, the book opens by going into the effects of the abolition of the back pass rule, explaining how the removal of one of their outlets encouraged defenders to become more comfortable in possession, gradually leading to a reduction in the number of old-fashioned cloggers and an increase in the number of more rounded generalists playing in defence. That kind of explanation simply doesn't need dot-and-arrow diagrams.

The book is very well-researched. I read a lot of website and newspaper stories about my team, but the book gave me a lot of background information about major events concerning my team which I had never come across before.

There was a lot about the book with which I disagreed, such as his excessive praise for Ferguson and his trivialisation of Mourinho's achievements, but ironically - in the same way that there is a modicum of satisfaction within the anger when one feels that a referee is favouring the other team - that actually added to my enjoyment of the book. It made the book thought-provoking, rather than just one which supplied answers.

I also found the book surprisingly gripping, finishing it inside a week despite it being close to 450 pages. It's been a while since I've got to the end of a chapter and said to myself "I'll just read on to the next page break", but I found myself doing so throughout the book.

If you like football and follow a Premier League team or the Premier League generally, I strongly recommend this book. (Obviously, if you have no interest in football, don't touch it with a barge-pole.) Possibly the best book I've ever read about football, and probably the most enjoyable. ...more

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Aug 24, 2019 Tosin Adeoti rated it really liked it

This afternoon, I finished 'The Mixer: The Story of Premier League Tactics, from Route One to False Nines' by Michael Cox.

The book is about the evolution of English football from a lowly sport to one that is remarkably unrecognizable from its humble start. The book covers 25 years of the intriguing spectacle people around the world witnessed.

This book is entertaining! Full of eye-opening detailed analysis into matches and behind-the-scenes which fans are not often privy to.

Right now, the Premier ...more

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Nov 24, 2017 Michael Sedor rated it it was amazing

If Inverting The Pyramid is the football tactics Bible then The Mixer is its New Testament companion, full of insight, lively, exciting, promising and a much much more rewarding and interesting read

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Apr 12, 2018 Abhinav rated it it was amazing

Shelves: essays, i-own-a-copy, the-cj-library, mind-boggling-awesomeness, non-fiction, favorites, 2018-reading-saga, sports-lit

Brilliant dissection of extremely complex football tactics. Give yourself a pat on the back, Michael Cox.

Five on five.

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Oct 08, 2017 Andrew Jaden rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites

A fascinating insight into the first quarter-century of the English Premier League, and absolutely a book for those interested in football tactics.

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Jun 09, 2017 Pete rated it it was amazing

Shelves: history, nonfiction, football

The Mixer: The Story of Premier League Tactics, from Route One to False Nines (2017) by Michael Cox is a book that look at the history of the Premier League and how tactics have evolved there. Michael Cox, according to Amazon and Goodreads, was an English biographer and prolific author who wrote many books and died in 2009. This means that the Mixer is possibly one of the best posthumous works on football. Alternatively the book may have been written by Zonal Marking's Michael Cox who also The Mixer: The Story of Premier League Tactics, from Route One to False Nines (2017) by Michael Cox is a book that look at the history of the Premier League and how tactics have evolved there. Michael Cox, according to Amazon and Goodreads, was an English biographer and prolific author who wrote many books and died in 2009. This means that the Mixer is possibly one of the best posthumous works on football. Alternatively the book may have been written by Zonal Marking's Michael Cox who also appears on Football Weekly, the popular Guardian podcast that features some football in between debates on the worst Indiana Jones film.

The book goes through the whole of the Premier League, starting in 1992 with the changes to the back pass rule to goalkeepers. Cox states that at the time English football was not in great shape. This does miss the fact that in Italia 90 England had their second best World Cup performance and if they had trained for penalties properly they could potentially have been world champions. However, Cox is definitely correct in saying that English football wasn't tactically particularly sophisticated.

Cox points out that in 1992 there were only 13 players who were not from Britain or Ireland in the league. 25 years later there were about that many foreign managers. Cox sites Cantona as one of the first big changers of English Football. Rather than just running around enthusiastically Cantona played very skillfully and intelligently between the backline and the midfield of the opposition, drawing defenders, creating space and passing to others who were exploiting that space. Following Cantona Blackburn won the League with SAS - Sutton and Shearer and pace and simplicity.

More foreigners came into the league in the 1990s and changed how teams were playing. Berkamp and Zola are particularly notable. Arsene Wenger then appeared and changed Premier League coaching by dramatically improving the health and fitness of his players and promptly won the League heralding more changes in the Premier League. Also the Bosman ruling changed the number of foreign players that could be fielded in all the European Leagues. In 1999 for the first a Chelsea team was fielded that featured no English players in the starting line up. Ten years later a game would be played with no Englishmen at all in either team.

Following Wenger came progress in Europe and more foreign managers, but also Sam Allardyce playing direct football. Playing only a single striker but with other attacking players became more common. Arsenal's Invincibles showed just how well football could be played.

More foreign coaches included Jose Mourinho and Rafael Benitez who brought their successful footballing philosophies to England. The midfielders Makélélé altered tactics with the way he played.

Following a slight defensive turn Rooney and Ronaldo changed how attacking football was played, reducing the role of just pure strikers. But in other parts of the League crafty use of long throws and set pieces by Stoke again altered what teams would have to face. Inverted wingers, like Robben and Ribery also changed the role of wingers in football.

Possession football, emulating Barcelona came to England, as did the new role of 'false nine'. Post possession counter attacking football, as played skillfully in an incredible season by Leicester appeared. Back threes re-appeared and were successful in the most recent Premier League season with Chelsea under Antonio Conte. But still the English push for 'second balls' remained in the Premier League.

Cox also points out that while the best teams in Europe are mostly in Spain that the best managers in the world now call England home and points out that the top seven managers in the Premier League in 2017 came from seven different countries.

Possibly this book is the start of a great series of posthumous sporting books and we can look forward to Kurt Vonnegut on the epic Warriors Cavaliers NBA finals. Alternatively this may be Zonal Marking's Michael Cox writing a fantastic history of the Premier League. The book is very well written and it's fascinating for anyone who is interested in football and the Premier League. The analysis of changing tactics and the personalities involved in English Football is really top notch. It's one of the best football books I've ever read. ...more

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Aug 22, 2017 James rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: football

A tactical history of the premier league wasn't the most exciting prospect, but it was a lot better than I was expecting, and this is coming from a former reader of Cox's website.

You don't have to go far to find people who are tired of the same punditry cliches, but in my experience there can be too much analysis that gets boring after a while. Cox knows what he is talking about when it comes to tactics, but reading this it became clear he is a football fan who is interested in tactics, and not A tactical history of the premier league wasn't the most exciting prospect, but it was a lot better than I was expecting, and this is coming from a former reader of Cox's website.

You don't have to go far to find people who are tired of the same punditry cliches, but in my experience there can be too much analysis that gets boring after a while. Cox knows what he is talking about when it comes to tactics, but reading this it became clear he is a football fan who is interested in tactics, and not purely a chess enthusiast. I certainly found it easier to follow as a Premier League fan (passing mentions of Stelios Giannokopolous will mean more to me than a Serie A equivalent) but Cox can write engagingly on a subject.

Set chronologically, this wasn't merely a tactical discussion, as there were descriptions of some of the key players and not just the greats - Cantona, Henry and Bergkamp were given top billing but there were also passages for Anelka, Delap and Tugay. They were understandably within the framework of tactical discussion, but with an acceptance that tactics are adapted based on the players you have, not just an imposed philosophy.

There is also a refreshing originality to this work - if a team won a crucial fixture, Cox was prepared to say they were fortunate rather using it to prove their tactic worked, and he was quite objective about Paul Scholes - he was a great player, yes, but he was rarely at the forefront of people's minds when it came to individual awards, and that he has been revered more since his retirement. For such a 'popular' subject, it was notable that it wasn't done lazily, and that is to Cox's credit.

The references to put the football in context were a little off-putting, along with the "David Cameron double" of West Ham and Aston Villa, but these are minor gripes in what was a very good account of tactics in English Football over the last 25 years. I'd perhaps have been interested to hear about more minor trends among the smaller teams (most mid-to-low-ranking teams were specialists like Bolton or Swansea) but this is a very good football book on a subject that is not wanting for competition. ...more

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Jul 21, 2017 Scott Cumming rated it it was amazing

For me, this Premier League offseason has been alienating with the increasing transfer fees and wage demands being reported seeming other worldly, so Michael Cox's book came at the right time as he boils down the history of the league to the sport on the pitch and specifically the tactics and evolutions of tactics within the English game.

The book is defined as a history of the Premier League, but it hits upon the travails of English clubs in Europe and the English national team - most ...more

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Oct 02, 2019 Trevor Kew rated it it was amazing

Shelves: kewsport, kew-nf

It has been a while since I read a really great book on football and so it was such a pleasure to plunge into The Mixer, having had it on my To-Read list for such a long time. Michael Cox is one of my favourite football pundits; I've been listening to him on podcasts for years and always enjoy his insights.

The Mixer was an interesting read for me because of its focus on such a well-known (we thought...) contemporary league, given that I normally read football books that are a bit more out there ...more

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Nov 07, 2017 Benjy rated it it was amazing

One of the best football books I have ever read. The authors knowledge and research are second to none and it was a pleasure to keep turning the pages. Michael Cox outlines the tactical and developmental changes in the way the game is played throughout the 25 years that the Premier League has been in existence. From the shake-up of the transfer system post-Bosman, the injection of Rupert Murdoch’s millions to showcase English football as elite entertainment and the spread of globalisation ...more

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May 17, 2019 Bidhan rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites

"I've heard Messi is good. But can he do it on a cold windy night at stoke."
Absolute page turner and a must read for anyone who follows the premier league.

Its fascinating now to look back on when premier league first started and how the league has evolved so far in terms of tactics, players and managers. As of 2019, the premier league has some of the best coaches and players from around the world. In it's formative years however, just the arrival of some remarkable foreign individuals (Cantona, ...more

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Jan 01, 2019 Brad rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2018, owned

This is a great book for Premier League fans. The book got more enjoyable for me as it got closer to the period of Premier League history that I'm familiar with -- 2012 and onward. The chapters before that were interesting from a tactics perspective but I wasn't familiar with the names of players or managers.

I liked the contrast between different styles of playing across European leagues -- the efficient German game, the disciplined and defensive Italian game, the technical Spanish game, and the ...more

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Jan 19, 2018 Matt Weir rated it really liked it

A really interesting read.
25 chapters for 25 years of premier league football tactics.

This, obviously, isn't a book for casual sports readers to enjoy. I've been able to pick up some great NFL and baseball books in the past having never seen an entire game of either in my life. Such was the style of the book.
However, this is for the football purists. This is for the premier league nerds out there.
If you're the type of football fan that hates certain teams just for being certain teams, then this ...more

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“A year before Wenger’s appointment, Leyton Orient manager John Sitton had been the subject of a Channel 4 documentary that recorded him threatening to fight his own players in a famously bizarre dressing-room outburst. ‘When I tell you to do something, do it, and if you come back at me, we’ll have a fucking right sort-out in here,’ he roared at two players. ‘All right? And you can pair up if you like, and you can fucking pick someone else to help you, and you can bring your fucking dinner, ’coz by the time I’ve finished with you, you’ll fucking need it.’ That was the 1990s football manager.” — 0 likes

“There are two types of coaches. There’s coaches like me who weigh up the opposition and ask the team to adjust. Fergie was similar. José [Mourinho] is similar. Then there’s Arsène, who won’t adjust. There’s Brendan [Rodgers], who looks like he won’t adjust. There’s Manuel Pellegrini, who looks like he won’t adjust … their philosophy is different to ours. Ours is more about who are we playing against. Their philosophy is more, “We always play this way,” and they won’t change, they carry on doing the same thing. That’s why you can beat them.” — 0 likes

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