LET'S get the joke over straightaway. Martin Jarred and Malcolm Macdonald's new compendium, Leeds United, The Complete European Record, will be the closest Leeds fans come to experiencing European football till...

Well, as a Leeds fan, it is too painful to contemplate. Indeed any pleasure in reading this evocative dance through the far-flung football fields of Europe is countered by the on-going farce at Elland Road. If only, if only, if only...

This book was originally planned as a celebration of Leeds United's return to Europe's top table: the rise of O'Leary's babies in a UEFA Cup run to the semi-final, halted on a bloody Turkish blade in Istanbul in March 2000; then the crazy fantasy of the UEFA Champions League, all the way to the last four in 2001 as chairman Peter Ridsdale lived out his folly of a dream.

Instead, the book now feels part of history, a bygone age already, the team as broken as the dream. The closing chapters chart the decline, the babies spitting out their dummies in half-hearted UEFA Cup campaigns under a tactically shallow O'Leary and, last season, a hopelessly out-of-touch Terry Venables.

The scowl makes way for a glow, however, and an occasional growl as Jarred and Macdonald travel back to the very start: September 29 1965, Leeds United versus Torino, Fairs Cup, 2-1, goals by Billy Bremner and Alan Peacock.

Set out in newspaper style, match by match, the authoritative authors recall triumph and failure, controversy (AC Milan, bent referee; Bayern Munich, another bloody bent referee) and crisis (Paris riot, 1975; Galatasaray murders, 2000).

Jarred, the Evening Press sports editor, and Macdonald, Stornoway Gazette football correspondent, have co-piloted several Leeds United books, and once more the combination of statistics, photographs and match analysis are as solid and reliable as Charlton and Hunter. Not even the long-forgotten Fairs Cup play-off against Barcelona to keep the trophy in 1971 escapes them.

No doubt, Leeds painter, decorator and signwriter Gary Edwards would have been there: he hasn't missed a Leeds match, home or away, since January 17 1968. Such is his obsession with the white-clad Leeds and his aversion to all things Manchester United - or manchester united, as he disparages them - that he refuses to paint anything red. Hence the title of his travelogue, Paint It White.

Ironically for a man who handles colour for a living and has a colourful tale to tell, Paint It White is more like Paint It Grey. His writing style is flatter than Norfolk, his story-telling disappointingly dull, and his waffling book will not be read all over, even by Leeds loyalists.

Charles Hutchinson

Leeds United, The Complete European Record, by Martin Jarred and Malcolm Macdonald, published by Breedon Books at £16.99 in hardback.

Paint It White, Following Leeds Everywhere, by Gary Edwards, published by Mainstream Publishing at £9.99 in paperback.

Updated: 08:51 Wednesday, November 12, 2003