Wow this was an amazing book. My favourite of 2016. Matteo comes to the UK in the late sixties and initially has trouble settling in England as a shy Italian boy. verifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ A must read for people like me who became a Mod in the late seventies and all people interested in this culture.’

For me, sport and smoking have always been synonymous. My first cigarette was at Manchester City v Carlisle, 1974. My uncle insisted. "You're old enough to suffer at Maine Road, son, you're old enough to smoke a cigarette." We lost, of course. For 30 years since, City has been associated with smoking and suffering. We were managed by Big Malcolm Allison, rarely seen without a fat cigar in his mouth. This was the 1970s - a decade in which the drooping cigarette and drink in hand signified suave glamour and sex appeal rather than cancer, halitosis and heart disease. English football's most notorious smoker, however, was probably Stan Bowles. By 1983 he was downing a bottle of vodka and 80 cigarettes a day. For millions of young football-lovers, the French soccer star Zinedine Zidane is a powerful role model. So when the EU was looking for sportsmen to front a campaign against smoking in 2002, who better than "Zizou" to bang home the message, "Feel free to say no"? Then he becomes a Mod after hearing the Jam and the book takes us through his journey from shy loner to popular Mod and local Anarchist.