Typically candid in his views on his career, his clubs and his team-mates, Tueart also pulls no punches in recalling his nine years as a director of Manchester City when he helped oversee the club’s resurrection following the potentially catastrophic relegation to the third tier of English football in 1998. He reveals the inside track on the reigns of managers Joe Royle, Kevin Keegan and Stuart Pearce, as well as the power struggles in the boardroom in the years preceding the takeover by City’s current regime.
As well as Dennis’s reflections on his football journey, and his forceful views on Manchester City and the game itself, the book is also packed with great stories – from the Sunderland training session which involved the defenders heading golf balls, to a tour to the Far East with City when Asa Hartford offered to help stretcher him off then promptly dropped him. At the New York Cosmos – who had signed him to replace none other than Pelé during the razzmatazz heyday of the North American Soccer League, and for whom he starred alongside Franz Beckenbauer and Carlos Alberto – he rubbed shoulders with icons of showbiz and sport like Mick Jagger and Jerry Hall, Rod Stewart and Bjorn Borg.
Offering an intelligent insight into the world of football from the perspective of both a player and a club director, Dennis Tueart: My Football Journey is a powerful and entertaining story of the Sunderland cup final hero, Manchester City legend and one of the game’s most opinionated and enduring personalities.
All Dennis’s royalties from the sale of this book will go to the teenage and young adult cancer unit at The Christie cancer centre in Manchester.
Born in Newcastle but considered too small to play for his hometown club, Dennis Tueart was snapped up by local rivals Sunderland, with whom he sensationally won the FA Cup in 1973 against the mighty Leeds. He signed for Manchester City as the iconic Bell/Summerbee/Lee era came to a close, famously firing the Sky Blues to League Cup glory in 1976 with the overhead kick pictured on the cover of this book. In 1978 he was signed by the New York Cosmos to replace arguably the world’s greatest ever footballer, Pelé. He returned to City in 1980, eventually playing 268 competitive games and scoring 108 goals for the club he continues to follow, and later played briefly for Stoke, Burnley and Derry City. After hanging up his boots, he forged a successful career in business, one that he combined with his nine years as a director of Manchester City between 1997 and 2007. He now continues to run a successful conferencing business, Premier Events, and still follows City from his executive box at the Etihad Stadium.
