Everton legend offers tasters for next year's autobiography: Big Dunc

If they could bottle his spirit and serve it up to our current lot they'd be a hard team to beat.

They don't make footballers – and football autobiographies like this any more. The brutally honest, warts-and-all memoir of the talismanic Everton football legend, a notorious hardman and reformed bad boy, the like we may never see again.

Lingham's bookshop in Heswall are taking pre-orders for signed copies.

The book is out May 2025.

I think we are now a hard team to beat. While the current squad lacks many things it has spirit in abundance.

With the help of Henry Winter's input, the book should be an entertaining and informative read. It will be interesting to see what Duncan says about the managers he played under, the players he played alongside, the referees he encountered including a certain Italian, his time in prison, dealing with burglars and so on. Plenty of rich material to get his teeth into.

I love Duncan Ferguson

An Everton legend to me.

ICT he took over had P6 and had 1 point. In the next 30 games they got 41 points - a rate which would have put them 5th over the whole season.
FGR he took over when they were already 4 points adrift at the bottom and after relegation and Duncan's sacking, they slid all the way to finish bottom for a 2nd season running and now out of the League. Something wrong which could not be fixed at that club.

Let's see how he gets on in 24-25

“Really got on my fucking nerves”, says Duncan. Know how you feel Dunc!!

For me, he frustrated. Not the first Everton player I've said that about. I'll never have a go at a player for injuries. It was his discipline that let him down more than once. I remember being at Charlton away with the lad and he got sent off. I got his passion and aggression, but there is controlled aggression.

Off the pitch, he seemed a totally different character. He seemed very passive as a member of the coaching staff aside from the short stint he had as caretaker manager.

He does deserve respect for his commitment to Everton. I just always have this lingering feeling of what could have been. He seemed to be a reluctant footballer.

But to me his passion, despite all his flaws, ignited what was and, to a large degree still is, a passionate fan base and for that he deserves to be recognised as one of the many legends our club has had.

Always lifted my spirits when he played.

Love the man and wish him all the best.

Mine? Maybe not an obvious one, but him knocking one in at a derby in front of the Kop.

He didn't get enough credit for how good a footballer he was. Because of his physique, most assumed he was a target man. He was actually decent on the floor.

Yes, he didn't play as much as we wanted but he was a damn fine player, brilliant in the air, amazingly adept on the deck for a big man, and terrifying into the bargain.

Rightly or wrongly, Liverpool people are notorious for a "fuck them" attitude and he represented that as though hewn from the sandstone rock this city is built on.

Joe Royle called him "unplayable"... but only when the "Hulk" had been roused. That simply wasn't enough. He could and probably should, have given so much more. For me, he will forever be unfulfilled potential.

I'll buy the book though. If only half of his rumoured off-field escapades turn out to be true, it's going to make for an entertaining read

I have always been a fan of Big Dunc, a player in my opinion, who gave his all for the club. Never boring!

I remember watching him in charge of Everton v Chelsea. An absolutely electric atmosphere that match.

Thanks, Sue, for link. I have reserved my copy.

Definitely over the top considering both teams were more or less doomed when he took over, and nothing to spend.

Duncan on his day was unplayable, brilliant in the air and a great touch, and he wore his heart on his sleeve, especially when he joined the coaching staff, and did a superb job when in temporary charge.

I still believe the Scottish FA were a total disgrace, it probably affected him and his family being sent to jail, considering they banned him fair enough, but as soon as he went to us he was done in court.

The European Court got him released for double jeopardy, the reason he never played for them again.

Who was that Leicester player he nearly strangled?!! He looked genuiely terrified!

And as for the person who broke into his house, he didn't need dogs, he sorted that out himself.

It will be a good read and there is no denying his love and commitment to Everton.

I'm something of a romantic when it comes to football, and he was always entertaining for one reason or another. Being in my early 20s, I needed a hero and for a while it was Duncan, so I'm looking forward to the book...

He may have not fulfilled his potential, but he was a proper handful and whenever he played I'd watch just to see what mayhem he could cause!

Some of his goals will stay with me forever, like those bullet headers and when he dropped Paul Ince as well as the Freund incident. Pure theatre!

Classic Duncan!!

Those days were few and far between, due either to injury or lack of inclination. I was always suspicious of his “disciplinary problems”. That day at Leicester, there had been no problems during the game, Duncan came on, within minutes he was strangling Freund. The whole thing seemed stage-managed.

Even his managerial exploits, including the shirt in the rain at Old Trafford, made me think he was milking it.

Despite that, I’m not calling him phoney. I suspect he is just a great big character, operating on a different level to most of us.

It should be an entertaining read.