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Subbuteo Tribute Website. |
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Welcome to the What's New page for 2024. Anything updated or added to the site over the next twelve months will feature here.
It looks like we're into "year four" of the monthly updates for this aging website. As usual, I still have a few more things planned, but the stuff that other collectors send in are usually the stars of the show. This year's updates started with a useful page of International rule books to aid collectors, and a bit of fun with Clyde Best. The key thing here is that other collectors will love to see your stuff. So if you have something interesting to share, please send it in. It doesn't have to be crazy rare. The site looks pretty comprehensive these days, but there are always gaps. Look at the fun Ashley and I have had filling in the box types on the accessory pages. There was all sorts of common things missed off. Find something quirky? Send it in.
If you have been using the 2023 Updates page to navigate the website, it has joined the 2020 Updates; 2021 Updates and 2022 Updates and in the archives. Follow the links to find all the stuff you may have missed if you've not visited for a while.....
As previously, I need to start with a big thank you to Alan Lee of The Wobbly Hobby Shop who is (still) providing the technology on which this website gets updated, and indeed put out into the world. Without it, I probably wouldn't be online at all. So send Alan and the Wobbly Hobby Shop some love.
Alan's grand plan is to get us all playing the game once more, and the last five years have seen new clubs, new tournaments, and a big Subbuteo Festival launched. Pretty impressive especially in the time of Covid restrictions. Now these have eased, it is time for all of us to get out and about once more. Be sure to check out your local table soccer club, where you are certain to find a warm, friendly atmosphere. I'll update my news section as appropriate, and don't forget to check out the English Subbuteo Association website for activities in your area.
The FISTF and Subbuteo World Cups - Tunbridge Wells Friday 20th-Sunday 22nd September 2024
The Tunbridge Wells World Cup really was a great festival celebrating both Subbuteo's past and future. I was lucky enough to attend on Saturday and Sunday, meeting friends old and new. On Saturday I watched the tournaments, visited the museum and enjoyed the walking tour along with regular helper Ashley Hemming. On the Sunday I volunteered at the Family Fun Day, and enjoyed playing with the next generation of Subbuteo players, before returning to the Sports Centre to watch Italy edge out England in the FISTF Quarter Finals on the big screen.
Full marks to the English Subbuteo Association for organising this exciting weekend, and massive thanks to Tunbridge Wells Council and The Amelia Scott for embracing the event. I should also mention local toy shop Whirligig Toys, who had a fantastic window display, a deluxe pitch laid out, and a full range of teams and accessories for sale. It's a long time since I've seen the game celebrated in a toy shop like that. They told me the England Women's set is their big seller. That's encouraging. They apparently sold lots of the new fence (and sold out of timers) during the weekend. Distributors University Games had catalogues available at all the events, and had provided some nice promotional posters/stickers to the toy shop.
To update on the activities (with a selection of my pictures from the weekend) -
More post-tournament details and photos are on the English Subbuteo Association website.
I've been using this picture of a beautiful FISTF World Cup England 2024 stadia/table to show the time and effort being put into this event. The pitches have been provided by Italian manufacturer Extreme Works, and their surfaces are absolutely my favourite to play on. (I think it is the confidence of having reliable close touch work). Anyway, Alan Lee has asked me to point out that a very limited run of these official pitches is being made available for sale to the general public.
Whilst on the subject of top level competition, here is a little collaboration with another useful and entertaining historical football research website - Pete's Picture Palace. Pete's interest is vintage press photos, and his site forms a useful catalogue of football in times past. He contacted my site having discovered this old press photograph from 1976. The description accompanying it is as follows:
“A friendly international in Rome as Stefano Beverini of Italy (left - playing) and Norman Gleave of England battle it out, watched by celebrity fan Denis Law - wonder whom he was supporting? - and famous Subbuteo ref Mike Thomas with the moustache on the far left”.
Obviously, Denis Law was the main draw for the photographer, and it is nice to see him watching so intently. Stefano Beverini, (who looks like a rock star of the period!), was the top Italian player of the time. He was Italian champion in 1975-76, and his book "Panno Verde Subbuteo. Io, Beverini..." was offered for sale in Italian distributor Edilio Parodi's catalogues. Norman Gleave was part of a Golden Age of English table soccer. He and Mike Dent were competitive in European competition in a way that British players have struggled to be ever since. The pair both made the final of the prestigious Europa Cup in 1976 (held in Malta), although it was Mike Dent who came out on top on that occasion.
The action is from one of the promotional internationals of the period, arranged by Subbuteo Sports Games Limited. This probably explains why both players are using heavyweights, as the English Table Soccer Assn players of the period still tended to favour the flats (which the company was keen to discourage obviously).
The Tipp-Kick Centenary.
Whilst we are celebrating Subbuteo returning to Tunbridge Wells for a World Cup, it is worth pointing out that 2024 is also the centenary of German table football manufacture MIEG, who have produced their Tipp-Kick game from their black forest base for all this time. To mark the occasion, a special exhibition is being held at their local clock industry museum. German table soccer historian Hans-Peter Hock has loaned items to the museum including a Subbuteo game (as shown on the flyer above), so the exhibition has wider interest for table soccer players. I suspect the details can be found online, but Hans-Peter has supplied me with a German Language flyer in pdf format which I am happy to send to potential visitors on request.
Note that due to requests, the What's New page scrolls in the opposite direction this year, so the latest updates will always be at the top of the page.
Updates for December 2024.
Last little update of the year. Where does the time go? Still, hopefully a wide range of weird things for this final selection of 2024.
A mystery promotional item. A recent email from Giovanni Buscemi asking about this little promotional Subbuteo set made me realise I had a similar photo in my archives, but not on the website. I think it had been waiting for more information. It's still waiting. This pack comprises a plastic tray (white or transparent) containing a single Hasbro figure with base, a ball, and a card advertising the Subbuteo Premier League range and explaining the fine art of flicking. I've no idea what it was included with! Does anybody know?
As was bound to happen, the Subbuteo posting labels for boxes have split out from the envelopes due to extra pictures. Subbuteo was expanding fast in the golden period of the late 1960s to the early 1970s and unified stationery was obviously not a great concern! Different labels from different depots? One of these boxes uses a Subbuteo logo franking machine, and the other has stamps.
Note that the box on the left is a classic Subbuteo stapled mail-order box.
Box Set regular Karl Warelow sent me this lovely picture of an original late 1960s International Edition. This has the horribly designed section for the extra accessories, with the cameramen oddly scattered. Karl owns this interior in a 1970 set with the later lid illustration, and flaps for the then new green rod goalkeeper for the third team. What is noticeable in this earlier set is that the metal rod on the third team doesn't have any fixtures.
Also worth noting is the original metal legged C110 TV Tower (although by this stage the camera/monitor are grey), and also the fact that the third team is a classic heavyweight ref 10 with black inners. Later on the third team was painted onto the moulded figures used in the red and blue teams.
On the subject of the original C110 TV Tower and the camera/monitor colours, I've realised I've never added the early colour variations to the website. So here is the metal legged tower with both light blue and dark blue camera equipment. I think these two are Ashley's sets.
These goal grips fall into the earlier A-Z range as set Q. Here are new pictures - from me showing boxes for Sets Q and QQ from the 1960s, and from Ashley showing Q1-3 on boxes from the 1970s.
Ashley has followed up his early OO scale cricket research/collecting with a little rugby expansion. This included a couple of early rugby kickers in colours I hadn't seen. Always useful; when refs 7 or 19 come numbered so you know which is which! I'm still not totally convinced that the two aren't identical (or at least interchangeable)
A pleasant surprise has been rugby kickers in plain brown stapled boxes - the kind used in Peter Adolph's 1950s mail-order business. Rugby items do seem to have been sold in a variety of plain boxes, but I hadn't seen these before. Perhaps the official box wasn't ready, or maybe most rugby accessories were supplied via mail-order originally. Rugby was introduced in 1969 in the Waddingtons era, which seems very late for this style of box. I had seen late 1960s football accessories in these boxes, but wasn't sure if they were original. This makes it seem more likely that they were.
Ashley's early rugby set has very pale coloured balls, as shown. Do we count this as another colour variation? The brown balls in my collection do seem to have a few different shades. However, these do look distinctive in Ashley's photographs. (Ashley has since sent a picture with four shades, but this might be getting extreme!)
Really part of the rugby updates I suppose. This is a set of football referees, but in green rugby bases. Quite a nice idea. If I had found these loose, I'd have assumed they were the rugby referees, which I've never seen packaged. But that is clearly not the case here.
Always read the small print! I've had a picture of three alternate Newfooty Players' Association badges on the website for a few years. Ashley has noticed that one of the cards inviting owners to enrol has fees dependent on which quality of badge was required - 9d for a celluloid version, and 1/6d for Enamelled Metal. I'm assuming the badge in the middle of my old illustration is the Enamelled Metal, and the cheaper looking version on the right would be the Celluloid edition. (the pin on the left looks pre-war).
Published this year on specialist football press Pitch Publishing. This tome, written by Derek Air, presents a decent overview of the current Subbuteo community, and the wide range of different ways the game is enjoyed by players, collectors, painters, and stadium builders, (plus interviews with sellers and organisers). It originated in a podcast, and so also has details on creators in this area. Some really good interviews, and interesting stuff all round. If I have a minor niggle, it is that we did have clubs, tournaments, swap meets et al before 2020, and that previous community torch bearers should also be celebrated!
Not a Subbuteo book per se, but this memoir of growing up in Northern Ireland obviously features the game judging by the cover collage. Plus gerbils... Never a bad thing. Thank you to Andrew Price, who spotted this on Amazon.
Tommy Spot at The Amelia Scott - Tunbridge Wells.
Among the prototypes and unpainted figures surviving in the Tunbridge Wells museum collection is this metal "Tommy Spot" figure. He is outsized against the Subbuteo figures around him, but the original metal masters can be bigger than the resulting figures. So who is Tommy Spot? Hurrah for internet searches, as a quick bit of research found that he was a small child figure produced alongside Triang's Spot On diecast model vehicle range. Spot On had distanced itself from contemporary Dinky and Corgi by having a fixed scale for all their vehicles 1:42, meaning you could buy a large lorry say, or a small bubble car. The range lasted from 1959 until 1967 when Triang purchased Dinky Toys. Looking at figures online showed that the metal master was not actually Tommy himself, but his father (or a mechanic - the same figure was used for both). Whilst not a Subbuteo Sports Games item, it does back up the fact that the Subbuteo Ltd moulding factory in Paddock Wood was making the plastic parts for other British toy manufacturers of the era. It was this production that encouraged Peter Adolph to move to the OO scale figures, and I'm guessing it probably put him in touch with pattern maker Charles Stadden.
Updates for November 2024.
Subbuteo in the 1940s, Subbuteo flyers.
There are so many interesting things in The Amelia Scott museum collection, that I might be teasing them out over several months. I had to start with this one though. The museum had an original 1947 assembly outfit box, a single button base, and various bits of paperwork from the early days. I took a picture of this advertising leaflet because I hadn't seen it before. When I was preparing it for the site, I realised the significance. This paperwork has no mention of the word "Subbuteo" anywhere. The only other paperwork I have seen that only uses the words "Table Soccer" like this is the original Boy's Own Paper advertisement from August 1946. So surely this must be the paperwork that was sent out to potential customers who sent in their 3d stamp from that first advert. That's a little exciting!
Of course, this also has the famous 7s 6d price of the initial set. The huge run of postal orders for this amount received by Adolph in advance of production made his initial edition self-funding. Like a 1940s version of crowd funding! In Peter Adolph's tale of Subbuteo's origins he mentions a figure of £7500 received in postal orders. Whilst that does use the same numbers as the price of a set (which was essentially 7.5 shillings), if we convert the price to decimal (37.5p) and multiply out, we get to 20,000 sets ordered. That's a lot of leaflets... However, coincidentally this is also the number of sets of TAF 4-2-4 that inventor Tom Waterman told me he had sold in three months, post the 1966 World Cup. So it is not an unreasonable figure.
A big thank you to Mark Skellon who recently acquired this named box Hereford United. He realised that I had it name-checked, but didn't have a picture for the site. It's always lovely when these old "shop request" teams turn up. I had mentioned this side in the original 1970-71 run of named box teams, but of course Hereford United were not promoted to the league until 1972-73. This places the side in the later "Scale Team" Splash box as shown, rather than the "Scale Players" box of 1970-71. So the description has now been moved to the correct section, and the team illustrated.
Another gem from The Amelia Scott museum in Tunbridge Wells. I knew from the last exhibition I visited (back in 2005?) that they had access to a figure from the horse racing set, but would he be on show this time out? Pleasingly, here he is on the top of a pile of racing figures (including bicycles). Ashley and I have both been looking for a good colour picture of this figure for ages and finally here he is. Hurrah. As always with racing games this is a card figure in the speedway shape. You wonder whether the head and arms could have fitted the larger shape, or whether that would not have left enough room for the horse!
The glass cabinets and reflective lighting at The Amelia Scott played havoc with my camera work. However, here are pictures of an official Subbuteo England cap from the 1980s, and a certificate awarded to players at the Subbuteo 1986 National Championship Finals. Impressively, this national event had been sponsored by The Star Newspaper. I've also added a little about the recent World Cup to the playing pages, and will add more when I get time.
A big thank you to Giovanni Buscemi who supplied this picture of the two Super Match sets side-by-side. As you can see, they have completely different interiors and contents under the same box lid. The dates of the enclosed accessories and paperwork are very similar - around 1981-82. Apparently they are both French sets. Bizarre really.
Longshore Products 2020 onwards
Included with the programme from the FISTF World Cup was a small advertising leaflet from University Games, mentioning the box sets, accessories and teams currently available. The team section included the picture shown, that looks not unlike Subbuteo catalogues of the 1970s and 1980s. This implies that UG intend to keep their current range of generic teams available under the new brand, as all are shown alongside the new official England and Liverpool. I assume each generic team will be updated to the new Longshore figure as the old stock sells out. It's not a comprehensive range, but at least the all-white side means you can paint Wolves or Norwich City or any of the other distinctive league kits that take your fancy.
University Games used this leaflet to advertise (or launch?) a new retail website for their products in the UK called ARE YOU GAME? This has the range as it stands, although as usual the older team box pictures are being used, so if you want to update teams from the old Paul Lamond versions, it might be pot-luck. What is noticeable is that a Deluxe Pitch is now officially a UK item. One of these was on display at Whirligig toys during the World Cup, and we had a couple of them among the vintage pitches at the Family Fun day at the World Cup. It comes rolled, and is rubber backed, but the surface isn't what I would called an Astropitch. The grass is not as lush! However, it is attractive, and seemed to play well when I tried it out. It is worth pointing out that it is not the same pitch as the Italian Astropitch version.
Ball manufacturer Mitre were one of the sponsors of the FISTF/Subbuteo world cups, and as part of the celebration they have produced both a Limited Edition Mitre Delta at Size 5, and a Subbuteo replica of their own product. The Subbuteo versions were used at the world cups, and can be seen in my photos of the event. The full size football is shown here, and is available from Mitre's own website - Delta Subbuteo Football. Not sure where you get the official three pack of Subbuteo balls though.
Also on 21st century branded products a couple of extra pieces of paperwork.
I had illustrated a birthday card and gift wrap produced by a company called Danilo Productions. At the World Cup they had product, and an advertising leaflet showing four more cards and their gift bag. These are available at their website - https://danilo.com
The second promotional paperwork is for the Royal Doulton figures from 2004. A neat way for me to show all the colours without having to picture all the teams.
The Parodi accessories page hasn't seen an update for a number of years. In fact, it was still written in present tense, as the range was produced during the life of this website (released 2003-05). As the site was running at the time, I thought I'd pretty much covered the small range of accessories produced. Some chance! Ashley and I have become aware of smaller accessories sold in bags with header cards, as SSG had done in the 1970s. I think these are really Astrobase products. They are certainly items I was aware of as table soccer products, but I assumed they had been sold under the later unofficial "Soccer 3D" banner. The packs shown prove otherwise, and makes me wonder whether other items were produced like this. Astrobase had a huge range of coloured balls around this time. Were any more of them sold under the Subbuteo banner? Somehow I suspect so. Of course, once un-bagged, you have no way of knowing. If you own any more of these products, feel free to send in details!
A change of pace. My short article on the magnetic football games of the 1950s-60s has a decent number of pictures of Soccerette photos, but far less of Balyna Super Soccer, which like Subbuteo, was made in Kent. So I've added a couple of pictures of different sets, and a rather nice shop window sticker, which Ashley found on a picture search. I own a set, and I'm not sure my box is this colourful. I'll have to check at some point.
As mentioned on the site, Peter Adolph told Richard Payne that he didn't regard Super Soccer as a rival. He thought the games complemented each other. The magnetic games are certainly a simpler form of soccer game, and were perhaps better for a younger age group.
Updates for October 2024.
I'll start with an apology for a misunderstanding. The card referee and linesmen set which took pride of place last month actually belong to Franco Esposito of www.thesubbuteomuseum.com, It is used with his blessing - and he has sent me a couple more pictures. Well done for finding this set at last Franco!!
The World Cup got in the way of updates this month, and then I came home with a virus... so a shorter update than planned. However, there are all the photos of the World Cup to enjoy further up the page, and information from the trip will get added next month. Still, this month we have an unknown heavyweight team (to me anyway), some dwarfs and a strange VHS related French set. And a little black history. What's not to love?
I started last month with an exciting find, and hopefully this one more than matches it. I was contacted by Mika Tuuri who is a player/collector in Finland. He recently acquired this side from another old player, and it is a known team within his circle of Subbuteo playing friends. This is Pyrkiva Turku, and they were in Finland's twelve team top flight in 1978 and 1979.
The distributor for Finland in the 1970s was Brio, who are more famous in the UK for wooden train sets. Research by Mika and myself suggests that the initial year used for Subbuteo's Finland club teams was 1975, and that promoted teams OPS (ref 245) in 1976 and KIF Helsinki (ref 240) in 1977 were also in the selection included in the 1978 standard range expansion. It looks as if Pyrkiva Turku arrived too late to make that catalogue, and therefore never made the standard range.
Whilst we always have to be careful of repaints, all the colours look right here, and so does the sticker (it matches the West Ham I have on a plastic interior box like this one). Even the spelling mistake is typically Subbuteo! Another team for the heavyweight collectors amongst us to look for!
Heavyweight Intro Dwarfs (moulding errors).
Long term French heavyweight collector Alain Arnal found this set of PSG heavyweights, and didn't know quite what to make of them. He's been collecting for even longer than me, and this was the first set of short players he had picked up. I don't have any either, but they are known in the community, where the little chaps are known as dwarfs. I have had pictures sent to the site previously, but this one shows off the height differences very well.
As dwarfs do vary in form and height (and some have heads that lean forward), it seems clear that this is an error in the moulding process, and one that should have been weeded out by quality control (and probably they usually were). Luckily, a few misshapen chaps escaped the chop, to give us examples of this phenomena.
Alain's PSG also had a pair of black players (not on dwarfs), and so I've added one to the black player gallery. As October is Black History Month in the UK, it seemed the right time to add a few more of the original Premier League range black players to the gallery as well. There are only a couple more to add. I do have a picture of the Sheffield Wednesday missing in the above row, but he isn't at a nice angle. All the teams on ebay in this outfit are "all white" sides. This team was in the catalogues for two years, with the black players added in the second year. Perhaps their scarcity shows the general drop off in sales for a team after the first year (and perhaps the reason for all the updated teams in this period).
The Amelia Scott museum in Tunbridge Wells had a couple of lightweight printed teams still on their sprues from different eras. This one was interesting because it shows all the black players from a Premier League side printed separately of course. I assume these players had to be manually sorted into the standard teams, and may explain why Subbuteo were late adding them to the range.
A quirky little promotional set from France, courtesy of Thomas Ponté. Thomas explains that the sets were produced in 1998 as part of an offer by Sony for VHS Video cassettes. Like the UK's Boots the Chemist chocolate sets of the period, this looks like a way for Hasbro to use up some stock as it withdrew from the market. The set has six (or seven) players per side, no pitch, and cardboard goals to be cut out of the packaging. No expense spared then! Note that both teams have the same colour bases.
Subbuteo in popular culture, 21st century branded products
Subbuteo in popular Culture is proving a popular page, and may run and run. Here are some rather lovely 15cm Subbuteo statues issued in deluxe Anniversary editions of The Housemartins London 0 Hull 4 (originally from 1986), and St Etienne's Foxbase Alpha (from 1992). As these are real products, they've been added to 21st Century branded products as well. Impressively licensed figures.
In addition, and very topically, we have a more unofficial Oasis T-Shirt with the band on table soccer bases. Thanks to Darren Ames for this one.
This update was produced to the sounds of "Only Love Can Break your Heart". Both St Etienne and Neil Young versions.
Updates for September 2024.
I'm starting with an exciting one. The cardboard referees set was only produced until 1956, and finding an illustration has proved elusive for about twenty five years. Regular picture king Ashley Hemming has finally tracked down a set. Well worth the wait! As with the celluloid set, the referee gets a double-breasted suit, and the linesmen only single. Know your place!
The set actually belongs to the lovely Franco Esposito of www.thesubbuteomuseum.com
Another little treat from Ashley. He sent in this picture of an uncut sticker set of the First Division for C112 The Football Club flag. This is from 1965-66 which was the first issue of the flag, and the stickers were also sold separately that year as C114. We know this set is from 1965-66 because that is the only year that Northampton Town have ever spent in the top flight of English Football. Makes this set a bit of an extra treat if you happen to support them! I also need to check my own set to see if these name sheets were updated each year like the scoreboard versions.
On the subject of scoreboard sheets (and on the same page), Ashley thought it would be nice to show all the different World Cup sheets produced for the old brown scoreboard. 1974 was very detailed, and 1978 rather basic (and incorrect - no quarter/semi finals that year!). The 1978 details were also issued with the black scoreboard when that arrived in 1979. We'll look at those in due course!
I've also added a picture showing some of the Belgian name tags.
Whilst I was about it, the uncut half-time scoreboard card is now also illustrated.
Also while in the accessory section, I took the time to add more of Ashley's bits and pieces. A better picture of Set J (showing all the parts more clearly) and a different tube of Croid glue. As Subbuteo offered this glue in their catalogues from the early 1950s until the early 1970s, there may well have been different styles of packaging, as with the Smiths Kitchen Timers. This looks like a later set.
In addition, I've added a picture showing two-tone balls to Set F. We know a two-tone ball was issued in the early 1947 sets, and from 1950-51 "varied colour smooth balls" were offered in the catalogues. These look pretty terrible, but they might be genuine Subbuteo issue. The problem is that Subbuteo balls were prone to breaking, and in my experience, second hand sets can have all sorts of weird and wonderful balls in them as owners used anything they had.
Updates often provoke a picture or two, but I wasn't really expecting to see a sky blue cut-out reference five just a month after saying I wasn't sure if this existed. It must have had about six months of production in 1949. Another good find.
A minor update to the cricket rules, with the various different rule books illustrated, and some new sections. The original OO scale cricket sets had rules amended from the flat game, and while I didn't need to produce all those rules again, I have quoted the changes for those interested or to help those wanting to play to the original OO scale rules (old school!). However, the much better 1973 edition of the playing instructions remains the full set of rules on the site.
Cricket rules (flats). Subbuteo flyers
This little sheet was an additional page in the cricket sets from 1949 all the way to the OO scale sets of 1966-67, although it has rather minor merit. As it has a Subbuteo Table Soccer advert on the rear, I've included it in flyers, as well as adding the rules "suggestions" to the flat rules page.
That page has also seen the 1949 Assembly Instructions added, just so all the early paperwork is recorded somewhere. It shows the paperwork you need to complete an early flat cricket set. I've added pictures of cut, and uncut cricketers just for fun. The chap who owned this set obviously couldn't be bothered to cut out the umpires (or the spare bat). The uncut picture has been fed back into the cricket accessories - flat era page, and I've also added a little picture of the early wicket stops to fill a gap.
Ashley's now extensive Cricket collection is continuing to get an airing on site. Here is the roller in three different plastic colours, with painted and unpainted handles. As with the stump colours, a long run of production has created a few variations to collect. Also note the two different printing colours on the accessory boxes. I don't own any of these boxes printed in black.
Talking of stump colours. I saw these in an old picture of OO scale accessories, and did a head-scratch. Are these the old stumps in white? Or are they painted? Does anyone else have the flat era stumps in a non-yellow colour?
When I started the Popular Culture page, this was just the stuff I was hoping for. A very busy can of beer graphics-wise, but behind the caricature of Chris Kamara, there is definitely a Subbuteo match breaking out. Close-up of the match on the page itself. A great spot by Darren Ames. There, so now you have an excuse to buy a can of lager (or two)....
An extra piece of Subbuteo stationery is this despatch note from the 1950s. One of those little treats you sometimes get in the bottom of an old Subbuteo box.
I can't finish this month's additions without a quick World Cup plug. Luckily, long-time helper Karl Warelow sent in a further picture of the beautiful "Subbuteo World Championship" set, which was released in the USA in 1994. Whilst this has essentially the same contents as the standard USA '94 issue (but with the advantage of having the home nation on the box lid, and a lovely card interior), the fact that the box refers to a "Subbuteo World Championship", might suggest that this was issued for the Official Subbuteo World Cup, which was held in Chicago in 1994, rather than the (slightly) bigger FIFA event. In this new picture is you can see a grey covered rule book which I think is exclusive to this set.
The Subbuteo World Cup in 1994 was the last "official" version supported by manufacturer Waddingtons, until now. The official 2024 Subbuteo World Cup is being held this month in Tunbridge Wells, supported by Hasbro.
Updates for August 2024.
The Subbuteo/FISTF World Cup events are getting closer, and the details for the weekend are being ironed out. Please note that the Family Fun Day at the Royal Victoria Shopping Centre now takes place on Sunday 22nd September. My initial plan was to visit on the Saturday, but as I've been asked to help with the Fun Day, I might be around on both days.
These photographs of the original metal master copies of C202 and C203 were online a couple of years ago, and I've been wondering where to fit them in the site for ages. I wanted a quiet month, where I could add them properly with some context.
Alan Lee originally sent the pictures to me, and these patterns are owned by 1980s Subbuteo Production manager Trevor Spencer, who rediscovered them in a shoe box! He told me he was proud of getting them authorised, and thinks that is why he kept hold of them (and they are the last new figure castings that Waddingtons did I believe, in 1983).
Looking at the 1983 trade catalogue picture behind the figures does suggest that they are at least two inches high, and obviously larger than the finished product. Andrew Stadden (son of Subbuteo figure designer Charles Stadden) had explained the process of producing figures from the masters to be like this:
To get from this master copy to the final plastic figures required the following process (or something very similar) :-
I don't know if these final two figures were designed by Charles Stadden. What is clear though is that the original masters have all the fine detail expected of Subbuteo figures of the late 1970s, but somewhere in the reduction process this seems to have been lost. The actual figures have bad mould lines, and look clumsy. I think they are the only new OO scale figures produced by Subbuteo Sports Games after they left the Tunbridge Wells area, and you do wonder whether the loss of the original skilled workforce contributed to the disappointing final result.
These details and those of the Beatles (see below) have also made me update the Charles Stadden page, which is a good reminder of the important role this master pattern maker made to the success of Subbuteo in the 1960s-70s.
New Page - The Beatles
Another set of metal master copies to have survived the passing years are these Beatles figures, which featured on ebay for a princely sum a couple of years ago. These figures already featured on the website in a newspaper picture from the 1960s, taken from an article about their sculptor Charles Stadden. We are also lucky enough to have the details of Mr Stadden's invoices, so we know that he was responsible for painting the figures including the exquisite guitars, and that he also produced the line drawing on the Subbuteo advert of the time. He really was a model-maker supreme, and Subbuteo history is richer for his involvement. It is also nice to see the actual master figures from the photograph sixty years later.
The extra pictures of masters and set have prompted the Beatles to escape the miscellaneous pages, and join the Space Games in finally earning their own page. Enjoy.
Looking through my old picture files for a bigger picture of the Beatles line drawing advert made me realise I had details for a couple more Companion Games Catalogues - 1953, and the illustrated 1964. Ashley has added 1963, and all are important. As I own the smaller 1952 version, it is clear that 1953 is the first year featuring Speedway and rugby. The 1964 version no longer mentions "Soccer Market" on the front, and replaces this game on the back page with "The Beatles". Ashley's 1963 still has Soccer Market, so we know when it was last advertised. 1963 also still has Speedway, but only as a standard edition. There was no track version by this time. Subbuteoworld currently has the December 1966 version for sale, and it pretty much matches the 1967 version I have, with the new plain cover, no Beatles, and the OO scale cricket.
Ashley sent me a picture of some semi-cut early Cut-Out teams, and when combined with the pictures of uncut teams I already had, this makes a nice little illustration of a team type that was only produced by Peter Adolph for a couple of years (1947-49) before the more familiar Press-Out versions arrived. (A few low-selling references hung on in cut-outs into the early 1950s).
We don't as yet have a picture for every reference, so if you have a different one, then please send it in. Currently, I am thinking that references 18-24 issued in 1949-50 were only produced as Press-Out sides. I'm happy to be proved wrong though, if anyone has one of these!
Focus on Rugby kickers; Rugby teams
I finally found these pictures in my archives (in the wrong folder). When I was doing the rugby kicker page I knew somebody had sent me pictures of a set with the green R24 Hunslet included - lightweight and kicker. So here they are. The set matched them with a lightweight of R13, and he wasn't on the site either. A couple of nice extras. All three amended teams from the R1-R26 range are now illustrated, but there is still only one of the R27-R37 sides shown. Can anyone help?
There are a few more rather dull 1950s flyers still to add, but this FA Cup one is a proper glossy effort. I've also added a better picture of the three alternate Cricket flyers/posters, which Ashley Hemming has finally managed to acquire.
Hiding in plain sight. The early rugby (cricket) fence, and small catching bases.
The three pictures above were taken from Subbuteo rule books, and have illustrated my OO scale rule pages for a good number of years. However, as Ashley Hemming and I have been dating the introduction of OO scale rugby, and especially the OO scale cricket, the significance of these original photographs is coming into focus. In the cricket pictures, look at the old batting photo from the 1966 and 1973 rule book on the left. I had spotted that the old style batting handle was in this picture, but I hadn't spotted that the catching bases were the tiny hollows, which we've recently worked out is a feature of the 1966 box set releases.
The early rugby fence (same as the early cricket fence). Rugby accessories
The rugby picture was in the 1969 rule book and still in the 1971-72 version. The fence behind the players is the solid version we know as the first cricket fence. If you have a 1969 rugby rule book, there is a further picture in the scrummage section (called photo "C"), that shows this fence even more clearly.
The familiar picket fences arrive in the 1970-71 catalogue as "new 1970 model - available July". They were also described as "new" in the decimal 1971-72 catalogue under each sport. In 1970-71 all three fences cost 12s 6d. This was an increase in price from the red football fence, but a decrease for both cricket and rugby, which previously cost 14s 6d. I'd assumed that this was an estimate for the incoming item on the rugby, but no, I think the cricket fence was doubling up in 1969.
Interestingly, the photograph of the white fence in the 1969 rugby rules clearly shows the "goal gap" where the surround doesn't meet on the short side. Fine for football, but odd for both cricket and rugby.
Cricket accessories - flat era
The text for this arrived last month, but I forgot the illustration. The gummed identification sheet gets an updated favourite cricketer when the copyright moves from PA Adolph to Subbuteo Sports Games Limited in the early 1960s.
Ashley Hemming rose to the challenge of finding a bagged version of TC-M. Rather wonderfully, this included a catching base. Who knew?
A big thank you to Shaun Stein who found some extra auction pictures of By Spacecraft to the Moon online. These included an extra page of instructions I hadn't seen before. So Peter Adolph's official space flight instructions have been added to the Space page.
Spotted somewhere online. Actually, I'm not sure this one was a Players' Association product, but that's the only place on this website with a wristwatch, and it made sense to group them together. It has also given me a chance to fill in a few details on the page about a "souvenir range" made for the 1992 Subbuteo European Championships which were held in Hamburg. The sweatshirt is already illustrated, but there was also the usual range of pen, wallet, badge and keyring all with the attractive Hamburg logo. In a competition for UKSA members, a further souvenir travel clock was offered. That would be worth a photograph if anyone has one...
It's the hope that kills you. Anyway, this little accessory set amused me while I was scrolling through ebay last month, and I thought I'd add it to the "Arts and Crafts" page. (If you are the producer, drop me an email!). The contents photo shows how simple the 3-D produced parts of this actually are, yet it looks really effective in the sales photographs.
Whilst Subbuteo's real producers Longshore would have to obtain an licence to produce an official "Euro2024" range, it does make you long for a bit of invention from their design department. Football presentation has changed enormously since Subbuteo's 1970s heyday. No more half-time scoreboards.
Whilst in Arts and Crafts, I snuck in this Shoot First figure from an earlier Euros, with his sculpted hair, and very complicated painted shirt. I've taken a number of photographs of a Shoot First collection, so expect a few more of these guys popping up over the coming months.
I'll finish this month with another bit of fun for the popular culture page. This picture came from the Evening Standard way back in September 2001. The FA Premier League Hall of Fame on London's South Bank had closed after just eleven months, and the waxworks of the selected "twelve best players" were being auctioned off. Check out those plinths though. Somebody in the design studio was having a knowing laugh. Ruud Gullit looks decently balanced for a giant Subbuteo player. Meanwhile, Ian Wright is hailing a cab.
Updates for July 2024.
A bit of a revamp of the catalogue and flyer pages this month, prompted by copies of the 1982 and 1984 price lists (which I was missing), and Ashley's work on the table cricket price lists of 1966-69. Realising that the sports games catalogues start to amalgamate with the football list in 1969-70 meant tweaking the dates of the catalogue pages, and adding an extra page to look at the other sports catalogues/price lists in a little more detail. As the early "catalogues" were really price lists, it did seem sensible to add the 1970s-90s price lists alongside the related posters and books - that way it is easier to understand how the whole range was faring each year.
I've now seen the yearly price lists from the year they were pulled out of the catalogues (1972-73) all the way to 1985. However, after this they get harder to locate, and were often just photocopies used for mail order (sent to UKSA menbers). At this stage, I don't yet have one for every year 1986-96. So if you happen to own a missing year, please send details!
As mentioned last month, the 1987 price list featured the official 61003-11 numbers for the various Club Colours sets, possibly the only place this appears. The full list has been added to the site.
New Page: - Companion Game catalogues
Ashley has been working hard on his cricket collection, and is trying to get back to the very start of the OO scale range. The earliest paperwork appears to be an August 1966 price list. Actually, there are two lists dated August 1966, ending the accessory range in different places, and then another for January 1967. An extra page of Companion Games catalogues and lists allows me to look at these changes in a bit more detail.
As mentioned, website helper Ashley Hemmings has been putting together a cricket collection, and has been chasing the origins of the OO scale sets back as far as we can find them. At present this seems to be August 1966. While a launch before the cricket season may have made more sense, there was a small matter of the 1966 World Cup for SSG to worry about earlier in the year.
Coincidently, I had an email from Mike Rayner, who had noticed the mystery over the bases with the smaller catching indents. He had purchased an OO scale cricket game when they launched (again, with August 1966 paperwork), and he remembered the fielders having these distinctive indents. But when he bought an extra fielding side a bit later, this had the usual larger holes, which he preferred. I had seen a couple of sets from the 1966-67 season without seeing this base variation, but thanks to a little bit of digging in the community, and Ashley's purchases, we can back up Mike' memories. As later sets in the same season have the normal bases, the small indents must only last a little while. It does mean that if you fancy having the original first edition set, you are looking at distinct bases, the early bat handle, two identical action batsmen, a thin score determinator, and probably yellow stumps and bats as well. All these things were tweaked over the next year or two, until the more familiar versions took over.
Ashley's early set also has rules that have not been properly updated. An extra slip of paper was produced to stop any confusion regarding coloured batsmen.
The removal of the price lists and companion catalogues from the Subbuteo Flyers page has made a bit more room for these extra goodies. It is really great to see a promotional leaflet for Speedway that matches the football and cricket versions of the 1950s. Also well done Ashley for finding a couple of shop posters for the 1973-75 era, which was previously a barren space for extra paperwork.
On the subject of price lists, among the ones Ashley sent over to me was this American list with prices valid to 30th June 1991. The latest Jokari list that I had seen was valid to 30th June 1987, so this is four years on. Interestingly, there was now a new distributor named AG Industries, Inc. based in Redmond, WA. The format of the list is very close to the 1987 version, but the accessories and teams available were only the standard 1990s versions, suggesting that the new distributor had new stock provided from the UK, rather than simply acquiring the old Jokari stock.... but as there is a gap between the two, it is possible that Jokari had sold off their old stock in the meantime. I own Jokari price lists for 1981 and 1987, and have seen details from 1984. Does anyone have a different one?
I found an extra "early" kicker in my own collection. This is R16 St Helens. These older kickers are quite distinctive. Anyone own one in a different colour? Have a check, and let me know.
In addition, Subbuteoworld have had a range of old Rugby Sevens sets in stock, and they featured a much wider range of team colours and player types than I had previously seen. (Usually they are just red/white vs blue/white lightweights). The most interesting set for me was all red vs all blue, in machine prints. Not only is the blue team an interesting lightweight machine print variation (the known white-skinned 155 I think), the kickers are of course painted to match. I had seen the all blue version of this kicker previously, and this set helps explain where he came from.
When I was adding to the Finger Football pictures last month, I noticed that the Lledo van pictures were frankly a bit rubbish. As both these models have been on display in my house for a over a decade, I thought I really should have better pictures, so I got the old camera out... but I'm not sure these two are a huge improvement. At least it shows the boxes. The white van was produced for The Subbuteo World Cup, which was held in Chicago in 1994. I think this was the last official Subbuteo World Cup before before this year's event (which is running alongside the modern FISTF version). The two-tone flags on the green van show that someone was making an effort here anyway.
Two more football books with Subbuteo figures on the covers, one from 1994 and one from 2020. I found them in different charity shops on the same day! I think this section might get filled up reasonably quickly, along with my bookshelves. Hmm.
Updates for June 2024.
It's always nice to have a new book. However, I'm not sure whether this one should be in my collectables shelf, or the football reference shelf. The book is written by Roberto Gigli, and the title is pretty accurate. In itself, it is a very useful World Football Almanac, but the main focus is on the teams that featured in the Subbuteo catalogues. Roberto's blurb on the back of the book explains the remit very nicely.
"When we were young, browsing through the pages of a Subbuteo catalogue also meant unleashing our imagination: "look at this team, it must be great!" Hundreds of clubs, from prestigious international teams and national sides to lesser-known ones, would parade before our eyes... But what was their history, their achievements, and what ultimately became of them? The seven chapters of this almanac try to provide an answer to these and many other questions of football history and statistics, in a clear, concise and, as far as possible, up-to-date form."
Obviously that's a lot of research! On top of that, there are also sections on modern league champions from around the world and the colours of national sides, illustrated with zombie figures. For those of us who enjoy home-painting modern sides, this is a delight. Head to Amazon if you are interested. - https://amzn.eu/d/2CVTsqy
A quick mention for a second book, which I found I had a cover illustration for. Written by Hans-Peter Hock, "HEIM-SPIEL Tischfußball im vordigitalen Zeitalter" ("Home Game. Table Football in the Pre-Digital Age") was the German language guide to table football produced to go with an exhibition at the State Museum for Archaeology in Chemnitz, which itself ran alongside the Qatar World Cup. Aptly, it was also in Subbuteo's 75th anniversary year. Details of both exhibition and book were on the Whats New 2022 page, and have now been added to the library page.
French collector Alain Arnal has very kindly scanned five French catalogues into pdf format and provided them for the site. Among his collection is the earlier version of the "blue" catalogue with the 57xx numbering system. This confirms (finally) that this was indeed a Delacoste range. The French league listing inside matches to the 1972-73 season, albeit that the list has 22 teams and the French top flight has 20. The extra teams were Lille and Monaco. Alain is pretty sure that Subbuteo first arrived in France in 1972. This might not be the first team listing though. My "Moments in Time" series last year looked at the season before - i.e. 1971-72, because it was a better match for the original Subbuteo range with relegated teams Lille, Monaco and Angouleme included. Interestingly, I can't find a French catalogue that mentions Angouleme, although they became ref 136 in the UK. In the alphabetical list it looks like their reference number was reused by Strasbourg (5753) who wore similar colours.
Does this mean there could still be another earlier blue catalogue? We do know there is a later one. Under an identical cover, an updated catalogue was issued for the 1973-74 season. In this one, relegated teams Red Star and Valenciennes were replaced in the "22" by promoted Lens and Troyes, who then received their own kits in the range. However, unlike Angouleme, team colours for Red Star and Valenciennes were not dropped from the numbered French range and remained available. This new version of the catalogue had the more familiar 656.xxx numbering system, new pictures of the box sets and a larger illustrated accessory range. So check your catalogues if you have them, and see which one(s) you might have.
Alain also sent pictures of his later catalogues, which I've called A-D on the site (as they are undated). Interestingly, his "C" and "D" catalogues have the same cover design (the D cover on my site). Essentially they have the same box set and accessory pictures, but the team page is completely different - being heavyweight photos in C, and zombie illustrations in D. This team information is exactly as I have it on the site. It explains why I thought I had the team pages for both catalogues, but not the covers. Oddly though, a different cover turned up last year, and seemed to fit the bill as being a "C", but maybe that was another catalogue again. That would completely muck up my lettering system, so we'll have to wait and see. Alain has also pointed out that the early A4 catalogues were often included folded up in team boxes - something I was unaware of.
The team illustrations on my Delacoste Teams page were mostly scanned from colour photocopies of catalogues, and Alain's scans are therefore generally better. I might amend some of the illustrations if I feel it is a beneficial use of my time.
As with the Set JJ last month, this is another little treat from Ian Maskell's loft (and a thank you for letting me photograph it). This is a RZ rugby scoreboard in a plain white box adorned with appropriate stickers (it really is adorned, there are five on there!). This set also has the team reference/number cards uncut and this has allowed me to illustrate the team names provided. As you will see, the Union sides are as eccentric on the scoreboard as they are in the team lists. This was the amateur game, but that doesn't really explain why most of the giants are missing. Mind you, Plymouth Albion got a team, and they aren't even included on the scoreboard.
Interestingly, the rugby fence is fully illustrated (with box) in the French catalogues. These show the proper brown box up to 1976, but a green box with orange label in 1977-80. That suggests a date order for these box variations, which I assume would apply equally to the cricket fence.
Well done to Ashley again, for finding this Subbuteo Cricket club edition with the alternative picture with the distinctive cloudy sky. I'd seen this reasonably often on the Test Match sets, but was beginning to doubt whether it had been used on the Club Edition. It is an early 1970s set, although it looks more primitive than the original illustration if I'm honest.
Miscellaneous Items 1970s-2001
After discussing the World of Sport edition via email recently, I revisited the section devoted to it, and felt it was rather inadequate. Given that this was the most expensive thing Subbuteo Sports Games ever sold, all it had were the pictures from the 1981 catalogue. Luckily, I had better in my archives, including these two showing an immaculate set, sent to the site in the early 2000s. This was one of those given to redundant Waddingtons staff after the Hasbro takeover in 1996. The case is sadly not very robust, so sets that were actually sold in the early 1980s usually look much worse than this. On the same page of the site is the Club Colours set. Another one of these has surfaced, this time sealed, and showing both the back of the pack and the fairly unexciting pens that were provided. Ashley has sent me a 1987 price list (which I hadn't seen) that gives the club colours sets actual accessory range numbers - 61003-61011. The accessory range had started at C101, which became 61101 (Floodlights), so 61003 is in a section that had never been used. I'll be looking at the price lists in more detail next month (hopefully)
Whilst on the subject of The World of Sport, Ashley also sent in this nice flyer from 1980 that shows that set alongside the then new Hockey and Rugby Sevens editions. The Subbuteo range was reaching its peak here, before the recession of the early 1980s caused the excesses to be trimmed.
I was looking at the card teams on Colin Forward's excellent team picture galleries (subbuteoteamscatalogue.com) and realised I could help out with better pictures of a couple of teams where his only reference had been my small site pictures. Whilst doing this, I realised that I had a picture of a card reference 37, and if Colin didn't have it, it meant I'd missed adding it to my site. Whoops. So here it is at my team list size, and if you want to enjoy it at a bigger size, you will hopefully be able to do this at Colin's site.
Another month, another modern Subbuteo product comes out of the woodwork! Here is a "5x5 World Edition" for the Greek market, featuring a smaller pitch and basic contents. The Brazil team appears elsewhere, but this is the first time I've seen a Greek national side - it is all white with blue trim. The set isn't a patch on the Total Soccer Futsal version shown last month, which had been made by Netcam.
I have also added a couple of pictures to try and clarify one of the minor updates of the Netcam era. Whilst the 2011-12 and 2012-13 Chelsea team releases are superficially identical kits, there are a few differences to both the box and the player mix. Among the players are different squad numbers, and their number nine becomes a blond. Is this enough to count as a different team? Perhaps only if you are a Chelsea fan, or an obsessive. I'm certainly the latter, so I'm glad to finally have both.
Another unrelated modern Subbuteo range were the La Legenda series of partwork releases in Italy, produced by Fabbri. Rather surprisingly, among the optional extras produced was a "professional" rubber backed Astropitch.
I've also added a few more pictures of packaging and accessories to the La Legenda pages. Some of the accessories added real value to the 12.99 euro teams, whereas some (a single piece of green fence?) clearly did not.
Subbuteo Finger Football is a game that most Subbuteo fans would rather forget ever existed... but for completeness sake, here is an England team pack, which Ashley found on ebay. He was having trouble locating the game on my site (which might be a good thing), and it actually lives on the "cross-selling" page. You could argue that it should be on the 21st century branded products page, and okay, some items are interchangeable between the two. But it does seem to belong with the Subbuteo branded computer games, and it is technically cross-selling in that it was using the Subbuteo brand to sell a game licensed from an American company called Atomic toys. The team pack is nicely designed, with the packaging cut up to become a goal, which is actually a good idea... but basically it is still just wearing little plastic boots on your fingers. Not a sophisticated game...
Another game that is not too sophisticated is Chad Valley's Big League, a 1970s rival to Striker. I thought last month's picture update would finish my coverage of this game, but no. Here is an alternative Five-a-Side version where the game is played on the cardboard box interior. Unlike Football Express or Striker, the cardboard is not flocked, so the surface is frankly rubbish. There is a second version shown on the site with a moulded plastic pitch surface. However, from my experience of plastic surfaces, I'd probably prefer the cardboard.
Updates for May 2024.
New Page: Focus on Rugby kickers
Site regular Ashley Hemmings challenged me to have a go at this one. He felt I hadn't done a "Focus On" for quite a while. So here are lots of rugby kickers for your delight. Honestly, who doesn't love these things? The standard R1-26 range is fully illustrated with kickers, and then there are bigger pictures for a few of the rarer sides. A very few of the rarer sides to be honest. Still, I think that's a 1978 Rochdale Hornets with its yellow/blue/yellow chest band. Anyone know different?
The original 1-26 range is actually a fun collection, and not too difficult to start putting together. Just check all the International Editions you can. Almost half-heartedly I currently own 18 of the first 26.
The green version of the score determinator gets illustrated. It's the pick of the bunch. Did I produce this picture with a green background, and then find it didn't match the page? Yep, even after all these years that still happens. Note to self - cricket equals sky blue.
A thank you to my friend Ian Maskell at the Worthing Five-Star for this one. He decided he no longer needed a set JJ ball raising chute (I can't imagine why...). Anyway, he managed to persuade me to acquire it, on account of it being a different box to the one I already owned. Ashley chipped in with a picture as well. Hopefully another accessory which is now fully illustrated.
Ashley again with this one, showing the difference between the two stretcher parties from accessory C113. These are hard to find with the tiny stretcher handles still intact.
Ashley has also been frustrated for some time by the lack of a picture for the C500 Northern Ireland (that's because I didn't own a copy to scan). However, one crisp picture later, and another little gap in the history is filled. I've tidied up the written details too for the coloured box releases.
21st century branded products - Mobile Phone fascias (2002).
One of the great things about running this website is that it keeps me endlessly amused. I was still laughing about the Bauhaus ceramics from last month, when they were topped by this gorgeous piece of plastic landfill. There is just no end to the Subbuteo related tat that is waiting to be discovered. These are copyright Hasbro from 2002, and are obviously tied to the World Cup of that year. I didn't have a mobile phone in 2002, so perhaps it isn't a surprise that this collection had passed me by. My vintage "emergency" Nokia might still look like this, but I've checked and the fascia doesn't swap. Awww. This is simultaneously a modern Subbuteo collectable, and yet probably the most out-of-date item on the site.
In 10000 years, archaeologists will be digging this stuff out
the ground and wondering what the hell it was for. "Ritual purposes".
A big thank you to Michael Fletcher who brightened my weekend sending this in.
He also updated me with some of the new Longshore reference numbers for
products, which was site essentials, but much less fun. They've been added to
the Longshore Products page.
A little bit of love for Total Soccer. Greek Subbuteo fan Steven Mourogianis kindly sent in photographs and details of his Greek derby edition of Total Soccer, which I'd never seen. This set also provides the pictures for the two individual teams that were produced for the Greek market. They were an annoying gap in my picture collection, and were very gratefully received.
I also found I had pictures of the Total Soccer Futsal edition stored on my PC. I remember the community looking forward to this set being issued, but somehow I never managed to pick one up. A nice reproduction of the FIFA sanctioned five-a-side version of football. However, I did manage to acquire an official 2010 World Cup set, and I dug this out of a cupboard and took some pictures for the site when I realised it was missing (slightly blurred pictures I have to admit). This set featured a massive Italian flag, and a tiny cardboard replica of the World Cup trophy.
Striker - Parker versions, Striker - Palitoy and Peter Pan
Ashley Hemmings has passed on his archive of Striker photos, and I've used a few of these to improve this section of the site. More of the teams from both the Parker and Palitoy eras are illustrated, along with some vintage advertising. There's more of this next month.
Keeping the updates a little varied, I've added a few extra pictures of Chad Valley's rival game "Big League". The most important bit of this update is finally showing the two different box layouts.
The Subbuteo Figure in popular culture.
.
I've recently acquired a few copies of "Flick me Sideways", which was the fanzine for the off-line Subbuteo collector's club around the turn of the millennium. They mention my website and even borrowed pictures, but oddly they never asked me to join. So basically, I was unaware of the club before it ceased. Anyway, one of their ongoing features was "Subbuteo in the Press", which usually featured Subbuteo graphics that had appeared in some kind of football article in the tabloids (although there was also some topless Subbuteo in the Sport newspaper. Quality.). This reminded me that I had a little folder of pictures featuring just this kind of nonsense on my PC (the Subbuteo graphics, not the topless.... okay you got me.). I'd put a couple of these pop culture pictures on the "What's New" page in 2020, but they never did find a proper home until now. If you happen to come across Subbuteo graphics floating around on unrelated products, or appearances in unexpected places please feel free to send them in. Illustrated above is Subbuteo selling financial products. I don't know why. Someone gets paid for this stuff. I've added The BetFair Gaelic football advert from last year because it wasn't a real product. The page ended up being submisc9, but I was very tempted to make it subpop, simply to confuse any Seattle grunge fans/search engines. There is a little logic to page names, but not much! All the files have names with eight letters or less because that was all you were allowed back in the 1990s when this site started.
This is not a very big page thus far, but an invitation to visitors to keep an eye out for examples.
Updating Wicketz last month, I was bothered by the lack of an illustration of the "green box" edition of the game from 1994. Well, bothered enough to pull a set out of my attic... Then I couldn't help but notice that my set is actually badged under the Paul Lamond Games logo, rather than the normal RDA one. The copyrights are still 1994 RDA, so I've no idea when this "exclusively sold" copy was actually made. I guess it is a further link to Subbuteo for these little cricketers. I took the opportunity to revamp the text on the site. Hopefully the run of editions is now clearer.
Updates for April 2024.
These days, whenever I say to friends that I've spent a couple of days updating the website, they always ask the same question. "Aren't you running out of things to put on there?". You'd think so. Then scroll down this update page for the first four months of the year. No I'm not running out. Where it all comes from is anybody's guess. Let's take a peek at this month's goodies - Shop displays. Streakers. Bauhaus. What more could you want?
The shop display page is one of a few that use a bigger picture size, but even these still seem inadequate sometimes. Peter Winstanley kindly sent in pictures of his 1990s "Goal" shop stand in 2020, and we now have a couple of trade catalogue pictures showing the thing filled to the brim with early 1990s goodies.
The Netcam page is becoming one of the most complicated pages on the site, and I think it really needs more than one page. If I could work out how to do it cleanly I would.
This is another weird Netcam variation. The all-white Paul Lamond England team release, shown on the right is owned by Phil Eccles. Looking at the site, he realised that the England team I'd illustrated (that I own - on the left) has team numbers on the front of the shirt and the shorts, but his team does not. Phil's side has nice all-red bases as well. After he pointed this out, I was looking at the Astrobase website (for something else) and realised that their stock matches Phil's UK release. It does beg the question "How much product have Netcam (and now Longshort) been shifting?". It is so hard to buy the stock anywhere, but they must be selling as obviously the teams need to be reprinted.
Box sets in the 21st Century - I've updated this summary page with the various known Longshore sets, from the Longshore Products page (so no new pictures). I've moaned a bit on here about lack of releases by Longshore, but if you wanted all the international variants of their box sets, you'd be looking at eighteen or so editions. That'd fill your house. Most are pretty generic though. You'd essentially be buying different box lids.
21st century branded products.
Whilst in town looking for a birthday card, I discovered a Subbuteo card in WH Smiths. Adding it to my picture files, I realised I had a picture of some modern wrapping paper as well. Anyone fancy a Subbuteo themed birthday party? Okay, just me then.
The A-Z range (A-M), C140-C169, C170-C193 etc. A Load of Old Balls*
In the Ashley assisted huge picture overhaul of the accessory pages, I'd skipped doing the standard/small ball packs... I wonder if you can tell why. This update includes ball packs with brown, white, and orange balls under Sets F and FF, and then C144 and C145, which include those sold as C144F, and C145FF. Oh, and 61144/61145 of course. Time to check your balls again (no, not like that). For a little bit of variety, we also have a set of rugby balls under a generic card label.
Sneaking into my inbox at the end of the month was a 61191 High Bounce balls pack on the late card backing. A big thank you to ball collector Diego Bonventi for this unusual little set.
*I got beaten to the Load of Old Balls punch by football historian Simon Inglis, who used it for a wonderful little guide to the surviving historic balls from England's many, many different ball games. And yes, Subbuteo gets mentioned and is illustrated. Published by English Heritage in 2004, it is well worth finding a copy if you are interested in sporting history.
Ashley's trip through cricket packaging has turned up these two extra items. I thought that this was the Bowler figure I didn't have shown in a packet, but on reaching the page I realised that was TC-M, the OO scale bowler (so there is a challenge for you all). However, as this bowler is assembled, and the other version was sold unassembled, I left him in. Also, the 1960s Deck Chair pack has an illustration because... well, just because. Green plastic chairs in this early pack.
Another Subbuteo Association price list has surfaced, allowing this page of promotional gubbins to grow a little. The key previously unmentioned item to keep an eye out for is a green and white Subbuteo belt (with gilt buckle no less). It would be nice to get a colour picture of this. This second list also features the known Subbuteo baseball cap. I've seen this in green within the community, but have yet to see a white version. I've also added a few more t-shirts and sweatshirts from the big tournaments of the 1990s. Someone had fun designing the logos for these events held in the dying days of the original Subbuteo era, making some colourful t-shirts.
Zeugo Superfooty etc, Misc Unofficial items.
With the retirement of table soccer seller Tom Taylor, and the closure of the Woodentop shop, I had assumed that the legendary Streakers set had passed quietly into history. Pleasingly, it has been pointed out to me that Italian table soccer producer Astrobase had added the set to their Soccer 3D range. So once again you can flick policemen after an OO scale naked person. Bravo. That said, the set is currently out of stock on their website. I adore the picture on the box inner sleeve, where the ladies look like their dull afternoon at the footie has just improved markedly...
This is where the site turns into "not Subbuteo" updates. First up, rather amazingly, are another three Newfooty teams in the 3D figure. As I've previously mentioned, when this site first started in the late 1990s, these figures were regarded as "prototypes", and a near mythical release. Turns out Crestlin managed to sell quite a few of them in their short lifespan.
Sorting out my downloads folder reminded me that I had been sent a few more pictures of 1990s cricket board game Wicketz. If you are new to the site, this game featured the same figures as Subbuteo cricket. Anyway, this information included more pictures of the impressive wooden collector's edition, plus a newspaper article from 1996 which explained a bit more of the history of the game, alongside the prices of the various editions. The wooden cabinet versions of the game were seriously pricy! Wow.
I've also taken the opportunity to add a few details to the information on Tom Taylor's Anchorman table cricket game, which was a true replica of Subbuteo cricket made in India with brass figures. My Woodentop catalogue from 2005 had pricing details on the various editions and teams that were available. It also had more details of the Streaker set that was produced for the cricket game. There is a tiny picture of this which I'll attempt to scan at some point!
Aquila Table Soccer (Prototype).
For non-regulars, Aquila was a final attempt at an "improved" table soccer game by Subbuteo inventor Peter Adolph, after he parted company with Waddingtons (and therefore Subbuteo Sports Games Ltd) in the early 1970s. He involved his teenage son Mark in the project, and Mark's tale of the game is found in his biography of his father.
I had seen the prototype set before (I think Mark displayed one at Tunbridge Wells museum, although I might have misremembered). However, I regretted only having small photographs of the set for the site. Anyway, further items have come to light within the community, and were picked up by my internet watcher Ashley (if they are yours, please contact me for a credit!). It gives the site nice pictures of the key "Animated Striker" figure, which was central to the whole experiment. It has also allowed me to show the prototype accessory box, and the players from the box set. The game looks like an attempt to replicate both Subbuteo and the more action orientated rival Striker.
Talking of Striker, a couple of Parker Games trade catalogues have come to light, and they give official release reference numbers for the original sets, teams and accessories. Plus some rather lovely pictures, that I couldn't resist. And a glamorous assistant. What more could you want? I have lots of Striker team pictures to add over the next couple of months, so keep an eye out for that if Striker is your thing.
Bauhaus Pottery !!
These are amazing. This was sent in by friend of the site Dr Hans-Peter Hock, who you might remember had an exhibition of table soccer in its many forms staged in Germany last year. This stunning (and expensive) high art pottery looked a little familiar to him, and me. Would those kits clash? (the bases do). I'm very tempted to reproduce them on a Santiago. They would make a cracking spare goalkeeper. Harlequins rugby club inspired?
I left the little Bauhaus building in the shot, to show how serious this stuff is. Bauhaus was a German Art School of the inter-war years (1919-33). The era of Modernism. Of course, if you are my age then Bauhaus was actually an English rock band famous for "Bela Lugosi's Dead" from 1979. "Undead, undead, undead". It was nine minutes long. That's value for money in a single.
Apparently, the European Community have launched a "New European Bauhaus" initiative, probably relating to the centenary of the founding of the original school. Or 40 years of Bela Lugosi's Dead. One or the other. The mission statement on Wikipedia sounds like every other mission statement of the last 20 years...
"The NEB is a creative and interdisciplinary movement that connects the European Green Deal to everyday life. It is a platform for experimentation aiming to unite citizens, experts, businesses and institutions in imagining and designing a sustainable, aesthetic and inclusive future." Honestly, that sentence includes every single buzz word of the 21st century... but I guess if our sustainable, aesthetic inclusive future contains Subbuteo then we're in right?
More stuff next month if you are unlucky.
Updates for March 2024.
Longshore Products 2020 onwards
Late last year, I was bemoaning the lack of new items from both Longshore and University Games in the UK. So this little item previewed at the January Toy Trade Fair was a bit of a surprise. Although it is called an electronic scoreboard on the box, it looks more like an electronic timer (I think it displays both scores and times). It certainly doesn't look like a scoreboard from a children's game. Nor will it fit into a Subbuteo stadium diorama. However, most modern club/circuit players have an electronic kitchen timer in their kit bag so that they can accurately time games. I am sure most of these people would love a proper Subbuteo branded version of that. Will this do the job?
I still don't think Longshore and partners really know what market they are aiming for. Kids? Collectors? Adult players? I'm guessing their perfect products would please all three groups. This one has gone on my wants list anyway. Lets hope it counts down and not up, and so is useful as a match timer. I looked at the review on The Hobby (previously Subbuteo online) and he is seeing it more as a scoreboard, and therefore a toy. Am I just being optimistic about the timer function? We will just have to wait and see.
With the teams in the modern range, a few more of the old Paul Lamond teams are finally switching over to University Games stock, which means new players and an amended box. I found this out when a couple of teams I'd ordered from a toy shop in the post-Xmas sales finally turned up. The red/white/black team was still in the old stock, but the sky blue/white was new. Most sites use the same generic pictures so it's a lottery, but looking at Subbuteoworld (which is aimed at collectors as well of course) shows that both the black and white striped team, and the blue and white striped team are also available in the updated format. The team codes remain the same, so I don't know whether this really counts as new products, but at least the team range is still being produced for the UK, which is encouraging (and not obvious from the official Subbuteo site).
On a worldwide front, the distributor list on the official Subbuteo website has updated. There is now a distributor in New Zealand (Findlays), and the distributor in Italy is now Rocco Giocattoli. Their website has the Astropitch and the Roma team available among the more standard stuff.
Frequent helper Ashley Hemming has been researching the accessory boxes for the Borras range over the last few months, and this has allowed me to fully illustrate this unusual overseas production. It has the added advantage of adding some unique content to the Borras Editions page, which was previously just a combination of items shown on the International Editions and team range pages. The accessory boxes look robust, and make a nicely unified set. There was even a box for the balls, which I was previously unaware of (as they were also sold on a bubble card).
I like the fact that the fence advertisements in this range show other Borras products. Perhaps a reason to own yet another green fence...
The Brazilian Pelebol range didn't have a fence surround sadly, and had to make do with a range of just four accessories (goals, 'keepers, balls, pitch). However, as another page that was constructed from details on the international sets/teams pages, once again it is great to be able to add some extra details to make the whole Pelebol experience more worthwhile. First up, at least two catalogues featuring Pelebol items have surfaced. This gives some nice professional pictures of sets when they were shiny and new, and also confirms all the reference numbers I had previously quoted. In addition, a couple of the Pelebol accessories have now been spotted in real life, including the only accessory sold in a box (the goalkeepers).
A further update of the Cricket accessories page has occurred, showing a few more items in their packaging, including the rarer sky blue box for the cricket fence, and a named bag for the pitch. Most of the bagged accessories now show an example of the 1970s header card for completeness sake. They are all pretty similar really, although it is worth pointing out that some have the Tunbridge Wells address, and some have the later Tonbridge one. Did they produce Tyne and Wear headed cards?
How about a couple of rugby accessory pictures as well? Okay then, here are a couple of football boxes converted to the rugby game.
A floodlight update. What would we do without one of these? Ashley has kindly recreated my original Floodlight range picture, showing more variations than I owned when my original was taken. That picture was taken well over twenty years ago, with a really low-res webcam. It is showing its age. We've also updated John Shelley's floodlight lecture a little, adding in a couple of variations. But it still holds up pretty well. The long-lived girder floodlights are really an icon of Subbuteo. Beautiful, if hopeless in use!
I think Colin Forward's new team website (see below) will eventually cover the zombie in more detail than I've managed. Nevertheless, a single player reference page does still seem useful and attractive. I recently had an email from Lorenzo Ogliosi with reference 99 as a zombie, which was one I'd never seen. In my archive, I found that I still had quite a few interesting team pictures acquired from ebay a few years back, waiting for an excuse to be added to the site. Ashley added a few of his own (and has more). So here is a quick zombie update dedicated to Lorenzo and to all the other zombie fans out there. I have more to add in the coming months. If anyone owns something unusual then please send it in.
It is not just Ashley who has been busy over the last couple of months. Colin Forward, who owns the Zeugo catalogue website is trying to collate all the variations of Subbuteo teams in one place. Quite a challenge!! His heavyweight pages just show a ridiculous number of base variations. And I personally own another couple that are not there yet. Marvel at all those huge team collections that you would never be able to a) afford, and b) store! Then be pleased that all those obscure sides still exist out there somewhere. Hurrah for people who didn't de-clutter.
A new base variation site has given me the chance to once again display this beautiful Burnley away on two-tone blue bases, which was one of my favourites when I was a kid. I picked this up second hand, and never knew who it really represented (reference 80 was blank in the 1979 catalogue, and dropped from 1981, the two I owned as a kid). So when I was running a "Roy of the Rovers" style soap opera in my bedroom, my little local side come good were represented in their mazy cup runs by this mystery team. And they never had to play in an away kit, because no other teams I owned clashed with this one. Happy days. I never broke one either. That was a miracle in itself.
I have to mention that this Burnley away looks lovely as a zombie as well (see the zombie pics above).
Colin's existing Zeugo team colours website has been incorporated into the new version. I've hopefully amended all the links on this site!
Updates for February 2024.
New Page - Trade Items.
This is a bit of a clean-up page. I've been sitting on quite a few pictures of Subbuteo ephemera with nowhere to display them properly. So they are now lumped under trade items. Included in the mix is a list of stockists, an invoice, some complement slips, a wall planner... plus envelopes and letterhead. If it had a Subbuteo logo on it, and you couldn't buy it.... it may well be here. Mostly "throw away" stuff that really shouldn't have survived.
The page was coming up a little short (or maybe it was a little boring), so the trade catalogues have been added in, even though they are also in the catalogue section. This new page does allow a few extra internal shots though, which is useful and hopefully informative. The trade catalogues are all attractive colour brochures, and well worth collecting.
Ashley Hemming finally found a decent sized ohw Italy picture to complete this row of figures. We'd both seen nice full team shots down the years, including a named box, but the players have always been too small to fit nicely into my rows. I had blown up a different picture last year, and that didn't look too blocky... but then I didn't have the original .bmp to amend, and didn't want to degrade the .jpg unnecessarily. Luckily, this version then dropped in. I do own much nicer Argentina and Brazil players these days (as shown on the Black players in Subbuteo page), so I really should clean those up... Once I dig up the original bitmap.
Accessories C101-C110; Rugby accessories
The floodlight box variations get more complicated every month. Here is the original white pylon box from 1971, with interesting variations. The first picture shows the 1960s white card interior, the grey light boxes, and stickers on the front of the box with the Set A/Set B options. The single pylon version is from later in the 1970s, and now has a green interior, and the options printed straight onto the box. Also shown here is the same box with a rugby sticker, for when it was R201 instead. (oh and a bagged Set RM whilst we are looking at the rugby accessories).
Ashley has sent me various pictures of C169 down the years, hoping I would update the tiny catalogue picture used. Part of his set displayed in front of his stadium is very pretty though, so that has made the cut. Hurrah. Interestingly, he sent another picture of the set featuring more of the usual boards that this set has (the comics), but this set has the later Lozenge style Subbuteo logos, rather than the Hobby Crest version. Neither of us had seen this late variation before. Time to check those sets (again).
A few more international rule books dropped into this new page. Lots more to find I suspect. Keep looking.
Subbuteo clones - Introduction
I felt like doing a little bit of painting over the cold and wet winter months, so I ordered a selection of blanks from Mark Parker at Santiago. This allowed me to finally acquire a couple of empty Santiago rugby boxes for a Fiji and an Argentina that I had painted many years ago, which have long needed proper boxes. It also allowed me to take a picture of this rather striking Santiago box for the rugby clones area of the website. The boxes are a limited edition, and they are lovely. Do I need to buy a Top Spin rugby set to go alongside them though?
I found this black and white picture in my archives, sent by a mystery Italian Subbuteo "detective" many years ago. He was sure it was the inspiration for Subbuteo's 1960s box art. As the picture is from the 1960 edition of the European Championships, and as the new Continental sets arrived in late 1961 this is possible. What do you all think? There was quite a bit of Subbuteo box art down the years, and I wonder who was responsible. The Airfix box artists are rightly celebrated. Subbuteo artists are sadly unsung!
Updates for December 2023/January 2024.
Don't forget to check out No. 6 in my "Moments in Time" series, which looks at the real life inspiration to Subbuteo team production, and always features at the bottom of this page. This time around it is the Belgian league of 1983-84. These will probably get collated into their own page once I run out of good candidates. There are still a few more to enjoy I suspect.
I thought I'd start the year off with a bang, and a page of International rule books. These tended to be unique until the mid 1980s, when the Green Sheet rules had multiple languages on a great big fold out poster, which probably annoyed everyone. I've pulled in the rule book illustrations from across the site, and then added quite a few extras. Above are a selection of late 1970s books that were clearly produced to a template (Belgium, Denmark and Portugal if you are interested).
The Japanese rulebooks are currently on Subbuteoworld, and some of the Scandinavian stuff I've had to borrow from the wonderful Subbuteo Museum. Otherwise, I've had a deep dive of my files, and Ashley has been "picture searching" online to fill in some of the blanks. I'm guessing there are more though. Currently, there is only one Italian booklet is illustrated, so lets see some more of those!
Longshore Products 2020 onwards
The page featuring the range of current Subbuteo licence holders Longshore doesn't see a great number of updates, does it? Even less for the UK distributor University Games, with the Liverpool sets from 2022 being the last update I'd managed. Here at least, is something new dated to 2023 for the UK market. It is a small training kit, featuring a goal, a target board, three cones, a ball and a man. For £9.95. There is no pitch in this one, so consider it an add-on. If you want a proper training pitch, then Subbuteoworld have produced one - recreating the old version in accessory C189 (from 1983), but in a modern astropitch style.
I'd mentioned the final two Netcam Champions League accessories on this page, but not added illustrations. Well, here they are. Scrolling through the busy Netcam page does highlight how little product we are getting in the Longshore era.
*It is worth pointing out that I've not seen the teams from the Greek Netcam sets, or indeed some of the French ones. If you are lucky enough to own any of these sets, please send pictures!
A big thank you to Roy Boulter for reopening the Clyde Best debate. Here is a Subbuteo representation of West Ham's ground breaking Bermudan centre forward from the early 1970s. The question remains - did Subbuteo's painters actually produce him, and did he edge his way past the quality control to make it into shop bought teams? Owner Roy is fairly sure that this team came from the shop like this, and the brown does look the right Subbuteo shade of the period. However, we can't be sure, as he is painted onto a flesh plastic figure, and so there is not any tell-tale light flesh paint under the brown. The collectors of the 1990s were pretty sure Clyde Best did exist, but vast numbers of West Ham sides pass through ebay in the internet age, and we just don't see him around anymore. Still, Subbuteo painters were generally expected to paint 1000 players a week, so some boredom must have set in. I would have been painting him in for sure!
He's awesome though isn't he? Once again, if anyone has any other Clyde Best figures, or any other black stars from the 1970s then please send them in (even if a bedroom painter did them).
While on the subject of black players, we are still six teams short on the original Premier League range from 1995. I've checked my teams, and most of mine are the earlier versions that don't have black players. I do have the Leicester City, but my scanner isn't working at the moment. Somebody send these in please.
Accessories C101-C110, Accessories C111-C120 etc.
The accessory box updates of last year are winding down, but are replaced this month by some more quirky pictures. I found an illustration of two late 1960s goalkeepers with a plain brown box. We know these boxes were issued in the 1950s, but Subbuteo weren't the only company to use them. So whether this is a genuine box is up for debate. It could also be re-used from an earlier set, as these 'keepers are quite late in date.
A big thank you to Phil Eccles for spotting something I'd missed. My illustration of the early version of C114 (Mascot and Bench Set) features two reserves with their hands on their knees. However, there is a further reserve with only one hand on his knee. Phil sent in a great picture of his set to demonstrate. Often you get two identical reserves, rather than a mix. Are they different dates perhaps?
Also finally illustrated - the press-out goalkeeper sheet. I've not cropped this around the 'keepers, so you can see just how much white card was supplied.
I think the floodlight pictures still need a little love - some are looking a bit too small. Here is a start, with bigger illustrations for the contents of the red sets of the 1960s. Note that the earlier "white box" floodlights have Subbuteo printed in red on the top of the battery box, whereas the "green box" versions have Subbuteo written on a green label on the front of the box. All the white box floodlights I have pictures of look like this. I'm guessing there might be a cross-over period though.
Ashley also sent me this half-time scoreboard variation. The printed letters can be in green or red.
This month in International box sets, we have a German edition from the late 1970s (with another alternate distributor in Hamburg?). Plus an improved picture of the 1970s Dutch set, and the bottom of the Crown and Andrews set from Australia. Some early 1980s sets do have a printed reverse. It is always worth checking! Thanks to Giovanni Buscemi for sending this one in.
Selected updates for November 2023 (Cool things you might have missed at the end of last year.)
New Page - European Catalogues.
A nice big update that has taken most of my time this month. Although I've covered the quirks and variants from various international countries, I am aware that I have not properly illustrated the catalogues from which these details are extracted. So here is a page of the European Subbuteo catalogues that I know about, or have illustrations of. In some cases I've had to borrow cover pictures from other sites, because I only own b&w photocopies of the relevant items. A number of the Italian catalogues were available as pdfs a year or two back, but the site seems to have closed down. I may see if I can add more of those pictures into this site if I feel it necessary and if the site/details don't reappear elsewhere.
In adding the French catalogues, a few missing details have come to light, and I found I had full scans of the Delacoste catalogue of 1981. This has the same cover as the 1983 MAKO version, but has different numbering and contents. A "blue" Delacoste catalogue has also come to light, but this has standard Delacoste numbering rather than the 57xx numbers on the other blue catalogue I have access to. Confusion all round!
On the subject of catalogues, a second Japanese version has surfaced in the community - this one from 1984 or 1985 judging from the "Green Logo" accessories. The box sets advertised in Japan at that time were the two tier International Edition, and in place of a standard Club Edition was the NASL set.
Just realised that this one is actually on Subbuteoworld - £199 if you fancy it!!
I have pictures from a 1977 trade catalogue which will be added to the website over the coming months. This catalogue has really clear pictures of that eras games set up and ready to play. For the more casual site visitor these pictures give a simple representation of what the games actually looked like. Here's Snooker Express to start us off. Makes you want to play it does it? Not a good idea though. It's rubbish.
In tidying up my picture files I found that I hadn't posted this alternate set of Giocagoal, which was Atlantic's cheap Subbuteo clone from the 1970s-80s. Atlantic soldiers have been reissued in modern times, and this set looks like it might be a more modern incarnation of Giocagoal, which would be useful.
The Subbuteo News Section.
If you are involved in the playing side of the game, then you won't need me to remind you that the FISTF and Subbuteo World Cups are "coming home" to Tunbridge Wells in 2024. The town is very proud of its history with Subbuteo, and excited to be hosting the event. They have other things planned around the occasion, possibly including a tour of some of the old Subbuteo sites, so keep up with the news. Some details are on the top of this page, and The English Subbuteo Association is the place to watch.
Shown above is a special Extreme Works World Cup pitch produced for the event. These look like they will also be available from our friends The Wobbly Hobby Shop. My friend Dave has an Extreme Works pitch set out in his house, and it is absolutely my favourite place to play. The tight control on the surface is fantastic.
The final two pictures are of a children's activity sheet given out at the English Masters, which was played in Tunbridge Wells in August 2023. This is part of the project to get children interested in Subbuteo (and its history), and the sheets have sponsorship from The Amelia, Heritage Lottery, the Arts Council England plus Kent and Tunbridge Wells Councils. Lets hope the profile of the game can be raised over the coming year of events.
A really clever retro-poster for this year's SubbuteoFest at Haverhill Rovers Club, which took place 1st-2nd June. Of course, it's a World Cup year for table soccer. As usual, there was a choice of table soccer tournaments to cater for all players - a FISTF International Open for the modern style, an Old Rules tournament for all you heavyweight lovers, and a Flats Tournament for the real oldies among you!
The Worthing Five-Star Table Football Club (Re-launch).
While on the subject of playing the game, I need to mention that my local club - The Worthing Five-Star - has returned to action. This is great news, as the club has been active since 1981, and has always had a lovely, friendly vibe. It returns in a new, and bigger venue - The Heene Road Community Centre in Worthing, and with four lovely new pitches. Whilst I will miss the slight insanity of playing in a sweet shop, the new venue will hopefully allow numbers to grow. A big thank you must go to Brian Barnes for hosting us in his tiny shop for the past few years. The re-launched club meets weekly on a Thursday night - 7:15pm to about 9:45pm. My circumstances are different this year, so hopefully I'll get back to attending when I can.
If you are on social media, the club has a facebook site - @worthingfivestar and apparently twitter as well @FivestarTfc (I hope I have that right!).
Longshore's Official Subbuteo Products.
This site is usually last with the news, but casual visitors may not be aware that a(nother) new Subbuteo range has been launched in the UK.
The new license holders are a Hong Kong based company called Longshore, and the UK distributor is University Games (who have merged with the previous UK distributor Paul Lamond). The box sets, aimed at the Christmas toy market are priced around £40. I never get sent review copies, so a "focus on" page will have to wait until I see a cheap one frankly.... The players are a new design, that has been described as "cartoony", which doesn't seem to have gone down too well with collectors (although I daresay we'll still collect any teams that are produced, right?). Perhaps the thing that was great about Subbuteo when I was a kid, was that it looked realistic and grown-up, which is what you are striving to be as a youngster. I'm not sure a "kids" product will hold interest of players going into their teens. That said, I loved Super Striker as well, and that wasn't grown-up in the least. So what do I know? Perhaps the teens will move onto the more specialised table soccer equipment (see below).
The official Subbuteo website has been updated, and you can look at the relevant distributors and available sets. There is a French/Belgian set and a Portuguese set, although to be honest, the differences are minimal. However, Eleven Force are still the Spanish distributor, so it will be interesting to see if they keep producing unique sets (the Atalanta set is on their website).
February 2022. At the retail toy fair in January, Longshore debuted a 75th Anniversary box set, and an official Liverpool FC edition and individual team. All were slow arriving to market (and even in January 2023 only the specialist Subbuteo stockists seem to have the Liverpool team)
The latest Longshore teams have been produced for the Italian distributors, so we won't see them in the UK. The striped teams were previously seen in the Greek range, and the "Lazio" is the same as the UK's unofficial Manchester City (albeit on the new figure, pleasingly). However, new to Italy is a rather smart unofficial Roma, complete with an attractive base combo. It is also worth pointing out that all the teams have goalkeeper rods which match the team colours. This just adds something to the overall look of the product.
New Page Longshore Products 2020 onwards is now covering this stuff in more detail.
Table Soccer News.
More new(ish) products in the table soccer community. My article on the competitive side of Table Soccer hadn't been updated for a while, and I find that the equipment is always evolving. I'd noticed in the months prior to lockdown, that when our table soccer club members played at tournaments, they would return with distinctive new teams and bases that "are becoming the norm". The teams had a very recognisable sunken inner base, and a new chunky player type, very different from the Stefan Corda figures (and its clones) which had previously been prevalent, and are shown in my article.
I've found out that this new range is called Tchaaa4, and it was designed by veteran FISTF player Daniel Scheen. Daniel is Belgian, and the range name (that looks weird in English), is apparently a phonetic spelling of a goal celebration pronounced more like "chow" in English. It amuses me that onomatopoeic words (splash, moo, woof) should cross language barriers, but don't translate as well as you would think. It makes me wonder how this website's English "comic book" usage of Arrgghhh, and sheesh, actually work in translation, but I digress.....
The Tchaaa4 range has actually been running for a few years, and has built up a range of different shaped bases for different styles of play. The actual playing figure is designed to be perfectly balanced - "front to back, and left to right". The players are available in a wide range of colours, so they can be used unpainted without clashing. This is either a colourful modern take on the serious abstract sport of table soccer (like table tennis), or it is a travesty that ruins the whole look of the game, depending on your point of view.... (Games Workshop stopped you fielding an unpainted army in their war gaming tournaments. I'm just saying.....) If, like me, you have a football kit obsession, then "paint-your-own" white players are available, as are some expensive decal teams of a very fine quality. Base decals are also produced, and look great. The range also includes many of the other useful items for the modern game such as polish, goalkeepers and handles, a measuring tool, and practise walls for shooting.
Friend of this website, the Wobbly Hobby Shop is now the official UK distributor. Hopefully this will make these products much easier to obtain in the UK. Find them on the website.
In updating The FISA and FISTF page, I realised that I had neglected to add the bases produced by another old friend of this website, Little Plastic Men, who produce the iBase and the CLR Dynamic. So I've squeezed these in too.
I feel the competitive pages do need to mention some of the other innovative table soccer products out their, such as Extreme Works pitches, and professional goals etc. These things really do make a difference to how the game plays. If your company is making or importing table soccer stuff, let me know, and I'll pass on the details here. Can't say fairer than that.
New Book - Subbuteo Storia e Curiosita Black Box.
Following on from the successful and comprehensive heavyweight and lightweight books , authors Matteo Lastrucci and Alessio Lupi have teamed up with black box collector Vincenzo Campitelli to add another volume to this high quality series. As Parodi production of Subbuteo only lasted about four years, you might think this would be a rather slim volume. However, the Parodi pages on this website tell another story, and this work lists a staggering 317 distinct teams/kits over the period, including all the specials from Subbuteoworld, World Table Soccer and That's Magnificent.
Hats off to Vincenzo for collecting all these teams, and recording them all for us to enjoy. (The photos of his collection/pitch room are a site to behold). There are certainly a few teams here that I had never seen before. It's lovely to be enlightened.
As usual, the book features stories and facts about each club or country. Also as usual, you will need your translation app if you can't cope with the Italian language. For the standard club/country sides, the history tends to concentrate on their achievements in the black book era. However, the Subbuteoworld specials veered off into new territory for Subbuteo with the MSL and some smaller Island nations. Here, the book gives a bigger overview. Once again, a big thank you to my friend Fabrizio Frazzoni for helping to arrange for me to receive a copy of the book. Also a big thank you to author Alessio Lupi at alessio.lupi@artlibri.it (who you can contact for further details). The book arrived at a difficult time for me, and so has been lovely to curl up with. My site has just under 300 of these kits illustrated, so I'll have to work out which ones I don't have listed (the very late West Ham away, and second version of Ukraine stand out).
The Updated Wobbly Hobby Shop Website.
The full Wobbly Hobby Shop experience is now available. The updated site is a joy to use, and now completely independent of ebay. So it is even easier for UK customers to obtain the Tchaaa4 range of high performance table soccer products. Other modern table soccer products are in the pipeline, and of course the site retains its useful spares service for replacement vintage players. Go take a look!
This website's technology sponsor, Alan Lee, has been updating the website for the English Subbuteo Association. The aim is to make this long established national association the central point for all Subbuteo and table soccer activity in the country. The noble aim is to bring everyone who loves the game together whether they play modern rules with sliding players, or old school rules with heavyweights or flats - or anything in between. As we are a minority hobby, this needs to include the collectors as well.
I would suggest that any collectors who don't play the game seek out their nearest club, and go along for some matches. I really cannot recommend this highly enough. I am aware that I am the biggest nerd going, and I am happy to sit in my bedroom surrounded by hoarded stuff. However, my local club coaxed me out of my shell about fifteen years ago, and I have to say that I haven't regretted a single moment of it. I've gone from being completely hopeless at playing to... well some level of mild competence.... We've played in extensions, and a tiny flat, and a (tiny) sweet shop. But all our members past and present have been lovely, and I've found tournaments to be very welcoming too. Most of our new members get up to my standard in a few short weeks (!!) so don't let fear of being outclassed put you off....
Now the Covid restrictions are eased, there are a number of events being arranged, and new clubs opening their doors. The English Subbuteo Assn website is the place to see if there is anything happening close to you. Take a look....
Moments in time (a series) (No 6).
1983-84 - The Belgian League finally arrives...
| Pos | 1st Division | Ref | Pos | 2nd Division | Ref | |
| 1 | SK Beveren | 365 | 1 | K St. Niklase SK | 564 | |
| 2 | RSC Anderlecht | 523 | 2 | KSC Hasselt | 201 | |
| 3 | Club Brugge | 454 | 3 | RC Jet de Bruxelles | 47 | |
| 4 | Standard de Liege | 480 | 4 | KRC Mechelen | 562 | |
| 5 | RFC Seresien (Seraing) | 521 | 5 | K Berchem Sport | 6 | |
| 6 | KV Mechelen | 305 | 6 | K St. Truidense VV | 47 | |
| 7 | KSV Waregem | 526 | 7 | KSK Tongeren | 2 | |
| 8 | R Antwerp FC | 412 | 8 | KFC Winterslag | 147 | |
| 9 | K Waterschei VS Thor Genk | 522 | 9 | R Charleroi | 34 | |
| 10 | KSC Lokeren | 525 | 10 | KFC Diest | 563 | |
| 11 | KSV Cercle Brugge | 520 | 11 | KSC Eendracht Aalst | 156 | |
| 12 | KV Kortrijk | 412 | 12 | KRC Harelbeke | 565 | |
| 13 | RFC Liegeois | 518 | 13 | K Boom FC | 454 | |
| 14 | K Lierse SK | 522 | 14 | VV Overpelt Fabriek | 286 | |
| 15 | KAA Gent | 519 | 15 | Wuustwezel FC | 564 | |
| 16 | Beerschot VAV | (55)* | 16 | RAA Louvieroise | 471 | |
| 17 | RWD Molenbeek | 524 | ||||
| 18 | R Beringen FC | 377 |
*Beerschot VAV seem to have been missed off the 1984 poster, but they were ref 55 the year before.
In some ways, Belgium's relationship with Subbuteo mirrors its relationship with real Association Football.
As befits a country with close geographical ties to Britain, football began early in Belgium. Their first league was set up in 1895, and this was the first year this had happened outside the British Isles. Yet football development was slow, mostly due to a determined amateur status. Belgium competed in all three World Cups of the 1930s, but failed to win a game. The amateur status persisted until the 1950s, so that was the state of play when Peter Adolph introduced Subbuteo to a country a short hop across the channel from his base in Kent. Again, Belgium was the first country to get their own distributor, but again expansion seemed slow.
In real football, the Belgian league turned semi-professional in the late 1950s, but not fully pro until 1972. As with many smaller nations, the advent of professionalism resulted in domination by a small number of powerful clubs. Since the 1950s Anderlecht, Club Brugge, and initially Standard de Liege have been the powerhouses. The rest of the league has a long history of mergers and bankruptcies as many of the smaller clubs struggle to compete.
When Waddingtons took over Subbuteo Sports Games Ltd in 1968, they began to expand Subbuteo's coverage in Europe by bringing in new distributors, and targeting countries with unique team colours and references. Belgium had started out well enough. Anderlecht's distinct mauve shirts were added in 1968 (ref 55) and Oostende's green and red stripes arrived soon after (ref 64). However, when full ranges started to appear, for some reason Belgium missed out. When you look at the other countries who benefited at this time - Italy, France, Holland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Portugal, and more, the absence is even more glaring. Even in the 1978 expansion which saw heavy coverage for minor Scandinavian leagues, there was no unique Belgian sides. What happened?
The Belgian team names did arrive en masse in the British catalogue of 1974-75, but all were on existing references. Whilst this addition included twenty four named teams, they were a random assortment that didn't tie to a particular year of Belgian football. They featured modern names like RWDM (Racing White Daring Molenbeek) who had been formed by merger in 1973-74, but also teams who hadn't been as high as the Belgian 2nd division since the mid 1960s, such as Willebroek and Union Namur. I get the feeling that the teams were copied wholesale from an existing Belgian catalogue list.
By the early 1980s the Belgian teams in the lists were nearer forty, but errors and duplications were rife. Several teams had two similar references listed. RC Jette de Bruxelles were listed under J (Jette RC) and R (Racing de Jette). La Louviere have three references (146, 157 and 320) when clearly any one would have covered them.
And so we finally reach 1983-84. This was during the high point of machine-printed lightweight production, and finally Subbuteo got a grip of their Belgian range. The old teams were dropped. The misspelling, and confusion of the previous catalogues were (mostly) sorted out. In their place was a full run of team references for both the first and second divisions of Belgian football. The particular year used is confirmed by Wuustwezel FC who made their only 2nd Division appearance of this era in 1983-84.
As you should be able to see on the above chart, more than half of the top flight received new lightweight prints numbered 518-525. In addition, the second division was completed with four references in the 560s (St Niklase and Wuustwezel doubled up on 564). The four references in the 560s do occur in the same year as 518-525, as the range had to wrap around the old NASL numbers.
The team range was cut back in the late 1980s, as Subbuteo concentrated teams on its core markets. So this is the last full league expansion of the golden era. Still, better late than never right? For UK collectors this is one of the hardest parts of the whole range to pick up - especially those four obscure 2nd Division references. The Harelbeke team with its distinctive purple (that the catalogue picture couldn't cope with!) is a very late hand-painted side. I wonder how many were issued?
See also the Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation. My kind of old school website. Old PC/dial-up friendly. No pictures, no thrills, just loads of wonderful football league tables and cup results.