How is Ben Cousins' book?

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I didn't realise Cousins saw himself as such a humerus bloke until reading his book. Telling the opposition cheersquad that he could make any line disappear, even the fifty meter line. Telling opponents during games that he has never been on the gear as much as he is now.

When he was arrested and knew the cops were listening to his phone conversations, he' called Michael Gardiner. "Gardy, they've ****en locked me up. They've only just realised that when they sacked you, they got the wrong bloke. Since you left the place has gone to the shithouse and it's taken them two years to get the right bloke."

Then he called another mate from the Police Station and asked him to "book a table at Coco's restaurant and order him a grilled fish and a splash of wine at a quiet table down the back... I'm going to be a bit late. Stuck in traffic."

His next call was to a player agent and Cousins asked him to get him a three-year deal with the Waneroo amatures for a caravan as a sign-on fee and a job for his girlfriend at the tuck shop."

What I enjoyed reading was how different rehab was to how he anticipated it. When he arrived in the LA Rehab clinic, he thought he'd have to deal with the average person who'd tell him how bad drugs are and why he shouldn't use them. But he was delighted that a 22-year-old staff member there, named Chris, had been to rehab thirteen times by the time he was 19. So, finally, Ben was getting advice from someone who had been in far worse situations that what he had experienced. Then when he returned back to Perth, he took Chris with him to make sure he stayed out of trouble.

The harder he trained and the better he played, the more he felt like he deserved to get on the gear. He didn't think he was doing anyone else any harm if he got smashed during the week and continued to dominate for the Eagles during match-day. It's pretty amazing to hear about the way he conducted his double life. He knew if he faced only a six day break between games, that week would only be a short week for doing lines of coke. Obviously he thoroughly enjoyed having an eight-day break because they benders could drag on for four or five days and he'd make sure he planned it to perfection so that, come game day, he was feeling free of drugs and fresh as a daisy.

I liked how he went into detail about his on and off relationship with Daniel Kerr and the staircase incident in 2002.

I was also oblivious to the bust up between Chick and Embley. I'd like to hear more about this, because Cousins didn't explain enough of it in his book. Basically, from what I understand, Embley went behind Chick's back and invited some chick over to Chick's house while Cousins was using. How was that Embley's fault, though? Then they had a couple of altercations during that week.

He also explains why he went so overboard with his 2006 premiership celebrations, because in year eleven at Wesley, they won the 1994 premiership and he didn't celebrate as hard as he should have. So that had been 12 years in the waiting. And when the final siren went in 2006, he fell to his knees and thought, "finally, what a relief that's over with", but he wasn't 100% sure that they'd won until he looked up at the scoreboard.

I enjoyed how he explained when the AFL made him apologise for bringing the game into disrepute, he didn't think an apology was justified. He certainly didn't feel like he needed to apologise, so he wore a white V neck top as if to say, "**** you, I'm hear to apologise because that's what you guys want, but I don't believe one bit of what I'm saying."

Also explained why he shaved his head. He mentioned he had been clean for eight weeks, but knew that having a hair test would reveal positive tests dating back to six months. He knew all the other tests like urine tests would come up clean, but when they asked to do a hair test, that was his way of saying "**** you to the AFL", because he felt they had a vendetta against him.

He also mentioned his moment of madness when he ran from a booze bus and tried to swim across a lake. Eventually he went to a restaurant and saw staff having drinks, and the chef answered his knock on the door. The chef said, "you're Ben Cousins," to which Cuz replied, "No I'm not, that bloke's no good."

Mentioned how great his family is. Mentioned how tough his Dad was struggling always being the rock of the family and trying to stay strong throughout his son's troubled times. It's briefly mentioned how Bryan considered suicide. Doesn't mention how strong the thoughts were, though it just crossed his mind.

I think the fact he explains he spent most of his childhood hanging around with an older crew led him to hanging around the wrong sort of people in his later year.

Was used to getting rejected by plenty of girls in high school and, by the time he was winning the Rising Star for the Eagles, he suddenly had all this interest from females. But he was resigned to the fact that they wanted the footballer, not the person.

The book depicts his long-term girlfriend Sam as a very strong character, to have stayed with Ben for so many years through those tough times, helping him out in times of need. Amazing that she stayed with him for so long.

Quite a decent book. I'd rate it about 7.5/10.
 
Glad i didn't waste $20 buying that crap ....the bloke is still full of himself and seems to have an excuse or convenient lie for all his actions and makes no apologies .....spoilt little boy that was never told "no"
 

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It's a really addicitve book. In fact it kept me up all night but i stopped reading when i had to go to work.

I never read before a big day at work. But the more i read it, the better i went at work.

And when i knocked off, geez did i give it one hell of a read. Lasted for days until i used up all the pages of words i had on me.
 
X_box_X said:
The harder he trained and the better he played, the more he felt like he deserved to get on the gear. He didn't think he was doing anyone else any harm if he got smashed during the week and continued to dominate for the Eagles during match-day. It's pretty amazing to hear about the way he conducted his double life. He knew if he faced only a six day break between games, that week would only be a short week for doing lines of coke. Obviously he thoroughly enjoyed having an eight-day break because they benders could drag on for four or five days and he'd make sure he planned it to perfection so that, come game day, he was feeling free of drugs and fresh as a daisy.

I liked how he went into detail about his on and off relationship with Daniel Kerr and the staircase incident in 2002.

I was also oblivious to the bust up between Chick and Embley. I'd like to hear more about this, because Cousins didn't explain enough of it in his book. Basically, from what I understand, Embley went behind Chick's back and invited some chick over to Chick's house while Cousins was using. How was that Embley's fault, though? Then they had a couple of altercations during that week.
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I too found his rationale to taking drugs interesting. It was almost as if he credited his drug taking with improving his football (the more he partied, the harder he would train leading to guilt inspired BOG performances). Just goes to show how much hold the drugs did have on him.

I don't think he ever went on 4 or 5 day benders during the season - well that's not how I interpreted it anyway. I think he was very fastidious about scheduling such binges and the reality is that with training committments he really would only have a 36 hour window in which to unleash. And he could only do so once he had ticked off a number of boxes eg. who they were playing next week, time between games, were they travelling etc. Certainly the 4 or 5 day benders happened frequently at the end of season though!

I was hoping he'd elaborate a bit more on the Kerr incident. He only really discussed tension that had bubb;ed between them during the season coming to a head on the Mad Monday due to Cousins becoming impulsive because of drugs that he was taking. I would have liked to have understood why there was tension between them in the first place. Was it because Kerr was dating Cousins' sister?

With regards to Embley, it was reported at the time that he, Sam and Embley's girlfirend went around to Chick's place to confront them and see where Cuz and Chick were. Upon arriving they found crushed up powder on the coffee table (Cousins says that it was Xanax - anti-anxiety med) and they also found a couple of girls who were still in the house. Chick took exception that they entered his premises without his permission (him and Cousins were elsewhere by this stage) and subsequently confronted Embley at the WCE gym where a fight broke out.

Bloody good book. Highly recommend it.
 
Great australian biography, easily one of the top few footy books ive read, and the first WCE-related one I can remember, which doesnt hurt.

Yes, that comeback game thing stood out to me as well.
He was meant to comeback against the lions, but missed that(and port the next week as well i think) to play sydney. WCE smashed Western bulldogs by 87 within the following few weeks. I remembered that clearly because it was the last WCE game I saw that season before the finals, since I had to go away for work for a few months.

There were some other very minor errors in regards to his version of WCE games. But its hardly an issue, it was much better than I had expected to be honest. Great read.

PS - something else I noticed is he didnt make reference to Phil Matera much in the 2000's, despite him having some outstanding goal outputs and missing most of the 2005 finals, leading to a somewhat premature retirement.
Once again, hardly crucial to the structure of the book, but just something I picked up.
 
Also something I should have known, but didn't until I read his book, is that Cousins kicked the last ever goal at the Whitten Oval. One for the trivia buffs.
 
azyboy said:
I would have liked to have understood why there was tension between them in the first place. Was it because Kerr was dating Cousins' sister?
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My understanding was kerr was dating cousins sister and was with another girl.
Although considering their tension perhaps kerr was just seen with some groupie and cousins just wanted a reason?
 
Are we talking about Mel or Sophie?

Sophie is a damn hottie, but maybe too young for Kerr.
 

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I've almost finished and I'm not usually a book person but **** this a good book, couldn't put it down for a few days and so much better than the doco, he doesn't hold back in the book whereas in the doco he didn't say much about certain things.

Also I've read most of the book but I've never understood if Chicky and Gards did drugs?
 
zigskillz said:
he's not one to rat on his mates (according to the book ;)). even kizon and those types are good blokes.
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Yeah I know he said that but it would be alot better if he told the truth, as he also said in the book, and someone said in the doco, his honesty hurts him
 
HSSB said:
I've almost finished and I'm not usually a book person but **** this a good book, couldn't put it down for a few days and so much better than the doco, he doesn't hold back in the book whereas in the doco he didn't say much about certain things.

Also I've read most of the book but I've never understood if Chicky and Gards did drugs?
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yes they did drugs,but ben cant name fellow drug users in his book
 
Read the Cousins book and now almost thru the Wayne Carey book.

Both books make for good reading. Cousins comes off more as a bit of a lad....from a good family and most of what he did really only harmed himself.

Carey however comes off as more of a beer swilling bogan who liked to fight....tough upbringing (awful in fact) that played itself out in his later life. His actions also hurt others and he was in denial about this fact for a long time.
 
Just finished Cuz's book and enjoyed it thoroughly. I'm endorsing it to all my mates, he doesn't hold back on what he thought of people and what he stood for as a person.. lucky to be alive, when you think of what he got up to...
 
Knights 24 said:
Read the Cousins book and now almost thru the Wayne Carey book.

Both books make for good reading. Cousins comes off more as a bit of a lad....from a good family and most of what he did really only harmed himself.

Carey however comes off as more of a beer swilling bogan who liked to fight....tough upbringing (awful in fact) that played itself out in his later life. His actions also hurt others and he was in denial about this fact for a long time.
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you just convinced me to buy the carey book
 
How can you not already have the Carey book? That is the hardest book to put down I have ever come across.
 

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How is Ben Cousins' book?

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