Welcome to a new section of the site called We've Got A New Book And Have Gone To The Trouble Of Reading The Index. Unfortunately, many sports books these days have denied Reputable Irish Sports Sites the opportunity to dive directly into the index and mine the book for stories about Roy Keane some famous sporting faces, but thankfully, Andrei Kanchelskis' new autobiography Russian Winters has not forgone its inclusion.
So naturally, it was our first port of call, and it has one of the more varied indexes of any of the sports books we've read of late. As you may guess from the title, a large chunk of the book delves into his childhood in Russia. Therefore, that and his wider comments on the socio-political history of Russia. Luminaries from these times are juxtaposed with recognisable faces from football, making it one of our favourite indexes in a while.
Here are a couple of examples...
G
Kanchelskis played with Shaun 'The Goat' Goater at Man City, while also declares himself a fan of Gogol's story The Overcoat. Gorbachev's resignation is remembered as it meant Kanchelskis became the USSR's final ever goalscorer (against Cyprus). More successful than Gorbachev in passing over a stolid empire to a more innovative and modern approach is George Graham, who is included in the book in reference to his accepting cash from a football agent.
H
'H' features occasional right-winger Glenn Hoddle and more regular right-winger, Adolf Hitler. The latter makes an appearance in explanations of the Nazi-Soviet Soviet Aggression Pact and Operation Barbarossa. Glenn Hoddle gets a mention as manager of a more thriving entity: Chelsea.
'K'
Along with a shot-stopper (Khan), Kanchelskis includes a living ode to his favourite rifle.
At school we had something called National War Preparation classes. We were taught how to strip down a Kalashnikov, clean the parts and put it back together. The Kalashnikov is a fantastic rifle. One of the reasons it is so popular with guerilla movements is that it is incredibly resilient. You can drop it in water, you can get sand in the mechanism, and it will still fire.
