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Specky Magee and the Best of Oz

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The crowd roared as the ball rocketed into the back of the net. Specky collapsed on the ground, feeling useless and humiliated. He had never felt so out of his depth on a sporting field . . .

Specky has been selected to represent Australia in International Rules, taking on the Irish in a two-test competition. They're the best of the best that Australia has to offer, but can the boys learn to play with a new set of rules and perfect their skills with the round ball before the Irish team wipes the field with them? And is someone trying to sabotage the Aussie team's chances of winning? The pressure is on and Specky has some serious decisions to make about his future before he returns home.

This trip to Ireland is definitely no holiday!

4
Your rating: None Average: 4 (6 votes)

Reviews

Aug 27,2012
5

Specky Magee and the Best of Oz was a thrilling 8th book in the Specky Magee serise which expresses us into the world of something that Specky has never explored before, a diffrent code of football. He travels to Ireland after being selected to represent his country in the International Rules Under-15 Championship in which he encounters many new challenges including a secret some trying to sabotage the Aussies game plan and Specky being played as goal-keeper instead of his regular foward position.

This is a great book which I have enjoyed reading more than a couple times and I would definetly reccomend it, not just this book, but the whole serise so far.

May 14,2012
4

specky is chosen to represent the under 15 all australian squad.They will take part in a international rules series against ireland. Specky magee and his teamates have to completly change thier game tactics expecailly because they are using a totally different ball. They lost the first test against ireland but theres still lne to go. One of australias coaches is cheating by telling ireland everything there planing.How will austtralia cope.


I like how the authors put in heaps of detail and suspence.


I would recomend this book to ten to fifteen year olds who are interested in sport and a action packed book.


 

Apr 24,2012
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5

I loved the great story base when they are in Ireland and the series turns tight!


I suggest this book to 8 - 15 year olds.


I give it 5/5!

Dec 01,2011
0

Specky Magee & The best of Oz

 

 

 

Specky Magee and the Best of Oz was written by Felice Arena & Garry Lyon and was published by Penguin Books in 28th of February 2011.

 

 

 

Plot:

 

This book is about a young teen named Simon ‘Specky’ Magee who is a talented and devoted football player. His mad about Aussie Rules but he got selected to play in the youth Australian International Rules team against Ireland in a two game test series. When specky go to the airport to leave to go to Ireland, his mates turned up to wish him good luck, Christina, Specky’s ex girlfriend turns up to say good bye, but Christina left a while ago and he started to get closer to TG ‘Tiger Girl’ he met tiger girl in a while ago in another book. Christina and TG are both trying to get Speck, so they both gave him a present before he left. Specky has to figure who to choose before he gets back.

 

 

 

Main Characters:

 

 

 

Simon ‘Specky’Magee- Specky is young teen and is Chosen to be the goalie for the Oz team. He is strong, fit and talented at football and extremely nice to others. Specky is very nervous and excited to play

 

 

 

Alice (Specky’s sister)- Alice is Specky’s sister and is very mean to him, she’s not very nice at all but she said she’ll miss him when his gone, she said to get him some perfume when his over in Irland.

 

 

 

David (Specky’s Dad)- Specky’s dad was never keen for specky to play football, but his dad is very excited for him to play for the International Rules team.

 

 

 

Jane (Specky’s Dad)- Specky’s mum is excited just like his dad is, but she is scared for him because he’ll be in the other side of the world

 

 

 

Grub- Grub is specky’s coach for the International rules team, grub is the best coach in Australia. He encourages specky to play better.

 

 

 

Main Part:

 

 

 

When Specky arrives to Ireland the players get interviewed. The first game was a practice match against Augustine. The Aussie team isn’t used to the round ball and they get hammered by them and at the end of the game both team start having a punch on, one of specky’s team mates hit another player in the face, grub and the St Augustine teachers had to break it up. The bad thing, the Aussie team has to stay with a player of the other for 24 hours. Specky stayed with the O’shea’s. Michael was the young boys name. Michael brother Patrick picked up Speck and Michael from St Augustine School.

 

 

 

When specky get to the O’shea’s house there mum and dad welcomes him in. They have dinner after specky settles in. At the dinner table Patrick is talking to Specky about AFL. He wants to go to Australia and play for an aussie rules team. After dinner Michael and Specky go up stairs into Micks room to play some XBOX. Before specky played his grandpa called him to see how it was going. Specky said it was great to play for Australia. After the phone call specky logged onto skype to talk to his friends but as soon as he signed on Christina called him, he started talking to her, but the call was interrupted by TG so he answered, specky had enough so he started play XBOX with Michael.

 

 

 

Michael dropped off specky at the Dublin oval. Grub Specky coach gave him the job to be goalie. The team went to the start of the series for the first game. During the game Specky ran the whole field and took on 3 players and kicked a goal and started to pump up Australia but they just fell by halftime. The scores at halftime were Australia 9 Ireland 41. During the game Australia gave up and let Ireland win.

 

 

 

After the game the team went straight to Galway to play their third game. When they arrived Australia played their entire tall’s in the forward line. They dominated the game for the first half; grub’s idea for the tall’s was brilliant. But in the second half, Ireland played there tall on the tall forwards for oz. Australia need to win by sixteen points. Ireland didn’t have what it took to beat the Oz in the second game and the test was won bye Australia. Specky was so sore that he got into the bus to drive to the airport. When speck got on the plane he slept the whole way back he couldn’t remember getting home.

 

 

 

When he woke up in his bed at home, his sister ran in and jumped on him thanking him for the perfume. When specky go up he went down stairs to say hi to everybody his grandpa Ken was standing there, Specky ran up to him and gave him his jersey. Ken was so happy he couldn’t thank him any more. Specky wanted to see his friends so he ran around the corner and Gobba and Robbo were there waiting for him, they started talking, but Christina turned up to say Welcome back, she gave him a present, it was a new Sherrin Football, they started kicking the ball and mucking around then Christina asked for her answer to see if speck wanted to go out with her, specky thought about it and started running to TG house, he got there TG answered the door, she was surprised to see him and gave him a big hug. Specky said ‘TG, I have been thinking” then out of no where he asked her out, they started going out and then the book ended!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Opinion-

 


  • I liked this book very much

  • The good bits were when specky was goalie and the team was stuck, specky ran out of the goals and sprinted and called for the whole field and got the ball took on 3 players and kicked an over.

  • The bits that weren’t good is when there just in the hotel doing nothing

  • I would recommend this book to others because everyone likes AFL or Gaelic and that’s what it’s about

  • I would recommend this book for ages 7-18 and I rate it a 4 and a half
Oct 24,2011
0

Specky Magee and the best of Oz, is a great novel about a young rising superstar named Simon ‘Specky’ Magee who gets the chance to defeat the Irish Gaelic squad and he has the biggest role in his Aussie team.

The theme of this book is about making your own decisions, and not falling into peer pressure. It is very common for people of Specky's age to get sucked into their friends comments. This is when Specky is trying to decider between AFL and Man U, and his mate is trying to persuade Specky to choose soccer over his favourite sport in the world.

This is a sporty, short story about a young AFL rising superstars journey to the top of his sporting career. This is an interesting book because of all the exiting events and matches, I was always wanted to know what was going to happen next. 

This book is a 4 out of 5 stars, it was always exiting and kept me wanting to read and read all day.        

Oct 21,2011
3

Specky Magee and The Best Of OZ is a novel written by Gary Lyon and Felice Arena that is about a team of Aussie Rules Superstars that travel to Ireland to play Gaelic football against Ireland.

I think the main theme in this book is decision making because Specky Magee has to make a few decisions including choosing a girl out of Tiger Girl or Christina, but the biggest decision of them all is to either continue his child hood dream to play AFL or to travel to England to play in the English Premier League for Manchester United as their Goal-Keeper.

I think that someone who loves there footy or soccer would love this book because there are a lot of Gaelic Football matches involved in this book. Gaelic Football is a cross of Footy and Soccer because its footy rules so you can handball, kick, mark and kick along the ground but the ball they use is round like a soccer ball.

I rate this book a 3.5/5.

 

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