Dec 3, 2020
Ben Dirs is a freelance journalist and author. He has written 21 books: We Could be Heroes: One Van, Two Blokes and Twelve World Championships (with Tom Fordyce, 2009); Karma Chameleons (with Tom Fordyce, 2010); Everywhere We Went: Top Tales from the Barmy Army (2011); The Hate Game: Benn, Eubank and Boxing’s Bitterest Rivalry (2013); and acted as the co-writer on Box to Box: From the Premier League to British Boxing Champion (by Curtis Woodhouse, 2016); Death Row – The Final Minutes (by Michelle Lyons, 2018); 401: The Extraordinary Story of the Man Who Ran 401 Marathons in 401 Days and Changed His Life Forever (by Ben Smith, 2018); Life According to Freddie Flintoff (by Andrew Flintoff, 2018); The World According to Harry (by Harry Redknapp, 2019); Break Point (by Ollie Ollerton, 2019); 999 – My Life on the Frontline of the Ambulance Service (by Dan Farnworth, 2020); What a Flanker (by James Haskell, 2020); Only Here For A Visit (by Alan Brazil, 2020), Right, Said Fred (by Andrew Flintoff, 2020), Too Many Reasons to Live (by Rob Burrow, 2021), Ruck Me – I’ve Written Another Book (by James Haskell, 2021), Lessons From the Edge (by Aldo Kane, 2021), Lifting: Becoming the World’s Strongest Brothers (by Luke and Tom Stoltman, 2022), Into the Void: From Birth to Black Sabbath – and Beyond (by Geezer Butler, 2023), Who Am I? (by Danny Cipriani, 2023), Throwing the Book (by Wayne Barnes, 2023), Does My Dog Love Me? (by Graeme Hall, 2024). Dirs was a journalist for the BBC Sport Website between 2001-2017, covering most sports but specialising in rugby and boxing. He has also written for BBC News, the Guardian, the Times, ESPN, CNN, Eurosport and Boxing News. Too Many Reasons to Live by Rob Burrow won the Sunday Times Sports Book Awards autobiography of the year and was shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year.
Website: www.bendirs.co.uk
Twitter: @bendirs1
Dec 3, 2020
George Dobell is the Senior Cricket Correspondent at ESPNcricinfo. In the past he has written for the Guardian and Spin Magazine. Most recently, he collaborated with Jonathan Trott on his autobiography, Unguarded: My Autobiography (Sphere, September 2016), shortlisted for the Cricket Book of the Year at the Cross Sports Book awards.
Dec 3, 2024
Karen Dobres is a writer, at the moment. She has had, and is still having, what is now officially called a ’Squiggly Career’.
She got off the career ladder when she was scouted, while still at Bristol University, for a London modelling agency. In search of a ‘proper job’ she ended up for a while at the Essex Chronicle in newspaper sales.
A close friend’s mental health challenges led her to also start volunteering at Samaritans and it was then that the next major squiggle occurred, as she decided to train as a Person-Centred Counsellor in London. Catwalk modelling recommenced, to pay for the counselling course. As a recently qualified, and unusually young, counsellor, she was offered the chance by Polygram Records to set up their first ever in-house counselling service, for staff and stars.
Motherhood brought this phase to a close. Two children later, and after a stint as Parent Governor at their school, Karen began to write, possibly as self-therapy. Initially, this was her own fashion blog, but grew into articles for The Guardian, HuffPost and various other journals. Her modelling career was briefly resurrected for a shoot with Knitting Magazine, but the most recent squiggle saw her unexpectedly elected as a Director at her local club, Lewes FC, where she was one of the pioneers of the club’s, world-first, EqualityFC campaign, whereby the women’s team received equal resourcing to the men’s team.
Pitch Invasion is her first book and recounts her seven years there as feminist-in-residence (not official title).
Follow Karen on:
Instagram, Linked In, Twitter, Facebook or BlueSky
Dec 3, 2020
Andrew Downie is the South American sports correspondent for Reuters. He has been a foreign correspondent for three decades, living in Mexico, Haiti and Brazil and his work has appeared in The Economist, The New York Times, the Guardian and GQ, amongst many others. His first book, Doctor Socrates: Footballer, Philosopher, Legend, was the definitive biography of the late Brazilian captain and was published by Simon & Schuster in March 2017. It has sold into many territories around the world. His latest book, an oral history of the 1970 World Cup entitled The Greatest Show on Earth will be published by Polaris in September 2021. He divides his time between the UK and Brazil.
Twitter: @adowniebrazil
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