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Miscellaneous Items |
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Subbuteo Association Items. |
The United Kingdom Subbuteo Association 1990 onwards.
The 1990 Subbuteo World Cup was perhaps the last big "hurrah" for the Waddingtons run Subbuteo Sports Games Ltd. The tournament was heavily promoted, with coverage on Channel 4, and I know it bought some lapsed players back into the game. Sadly, it was a short lived success. The advance of the games console in the 1990s saw Subbuteo sales trail off. Waddingtons withdrew its financial support of the UKSA in 1993, and by the time Hasbro purchased the company in 1995, the whole game was on a downward spiral.
However, head back to 1990, and we find the UKSA busy raising funds with a list of promotional items. These were advertised on the reverse of the standard Waddingtons Subbuteo order form, and also sold through the UKSA club magazine (called Subbuteo Scene in the 1990s).
Rather pleasingly, the accessories were given their own reference system, which matches quite nicely to the standard Subbuteo ones. This information allows me to add a few extra Subbuteo items to the website - including a watch that had previously been sighted in the community.
April 2024 - Another list and later items have also come to light, sadly without the reference numbers. These are shown at the bottom of this page.
UK200: Sports Bag.
This rather garish green holdall (the UKSA preferred the word "striking") had been in the standard Subbuteo range as C200 in the early 1980s, and there was clearly still a big pile of them in the warehouse..... All the other items in 1990 have UK5xx numbers, but I like the fact that this one reflects the old C200 number.
See C200-61221 for the original entry for this bag.
In 1990 it was priced at £4.
January 2023: I've added a picture from my archive of a slightly less garish green holdall with falcon crest. This may well be a version sold to UKSA members. Is this one more striking than the usual I ask myself.
UK500 Sports Shirt.
This sports shirt was embroidered with the UKSA logo, and available in three colours - Jade, Navy, and Sky.
The shirt cost £7.50 in the smaller size (26/28 and 30/32) and £9.50 in the more adult ones (34/36 to 44)
UK501 Jumper.
This acrylic sweater was available in a single colour - navy - and once again featured the UKSA logo.
The jumper was £9 in small sizes (26 and 30), and £11.50 in the bigger ones (34-44)
UK503 Roma 1990 T-Shirt.
The stunning Subbuteo world cup logo on a quality white t-shirt.
UK502 is not on the 1990 list. UK 503 was a simple t-shirt with the big logo used for the Rome tournament. The T-Shirt cost £5, whatever size you needed (S, M, L or XL).
UK504 Stopwatch.
The most useful item on this list, this was described as a "LCD display keyring timer with countdown facility, and end of game BUZZER". I've never seen one of these. Frankly, I'm a bit worried by the use of capitals for that buzzer. Loud?
Subbuteo had not sold a timer since Peter Adolph offered the old Smiths Kitchen timer in the 1950s-70s.
The keyring timer was priced at £3.50, which seems great value compared to the watch shown below.
UK505 Fashion Watch.
Grey strap with stunning Subbuteo watch face design.
The blurb writer loved the use of the word "stunning" - see the t-shirt. Subbuteo collector Chris Allen has one of these, and we wondered whether it was a "proper" Subbuteo release, and where it fitted in. So lovely to see it on an official list. It was guaranteed for a year (so its a bit late to send it back).
The price in 1990 was £10. This was much more expensive than the timer....
And seems a lot of money for a cheap looking plastic watch....
UK506 Ball and Falcon Gift Badge.
This allowed UKSA members to order a second badge, if they had lost the first. It only cost 60p, and you received a Subbuteo ball into the bargain. It was only available to UKSA members. So you could order a UKSA sports shirt as a non-member, but clearly bad things happened if you wore the badge and weren't a memb..... oh.... Perhaps I should leave mine on the shelf huh?
UK507 Pen.
Subbuteo club retractable pen in the Subbuteo colours of red,
white and green.
Subbuteo had official colours? Who Knew? Actually, they just sound like the Italian flag colours used for the Roma World Cup.
The pen cost 80p in 1990.
A pen in the correct colours has turned up. Thanks to Alan Lee for this one.
These accessories are getting a bit more predictable now. I guess we should be grateful there isn't an eraser, or a pencil sharpener. What next? A mug?
UK508 Roma 1990 Mug.
What Subbuteo event would be complete without a proper mug? (Certainly not the 2021 Subbuteo Festival - plug). This original Subbuteo one cost £1.50 in 1990 and simply featured the World Cup logo.
Probably not sold under this reference (but where else does it fit?) is this earlier mug advertising the European Championship held in Brussels in 1988.
Subbuteo Shop Order Form - Undated.
A different Subbuteo shop flyer has come to light, selling a slightly different array of UKSA products. This one has no reference numbers, and is sadly undated. Our friend the Subbuteo holdall makes a familar appearance (here once again with the more familiar Subbuteo lozenge logo). The price was £3.99, which was comparable with the 1990 range shown above. Cheques were to be made payable to the Subbuteo Association. A useful fund raiser I imagine.
An item not seen on the previous flyer was a Subbuteo belt. The picture pretty much sums this item up. I find little to say about it, but the descriptive blurb from the order form is shown below. There was also a different pen offered in a more chunky design.
Subbuteo Belt - A green belt with white Subbuteo lettering and gilt buckle. Price 60p
Subbuteo Pen - Shock absorber style ball point pen in green with the Subbuteo logo printed in black. Price 50p
On the clothing front, this flyer has a very bold t-shirt, a sweat shirt with tiny logo, and a pair of baseball caps. Regular visitors will have seen the vintage hat range squeezed into the clothing lines on the 21st century branded products page, but it is nice to find details of where this cap was originally sold. The rather horrible safari hat doesn't feature on this one, but I suspect it will turn up before too long.
Subbuteo Caps - Baseball style caps with Subbuteo logo and name on front. Available in green or white, in Childs or Adults sizes. 75p plus 25p P&P.
Subbuteo T-Shirt - In white cotton with short sleeves and round neck, printed with Subbuteo name and logo across the front. Only available in 26/28/30/32/34 sizes at the moment. £1.75 plus 25p P&P
Subbuteo Sweat Shirt - In 50% cotton 50% acrylic blend, long sleeves and round neck printed with miniature Subbuteo name and logo across left front. Available in 26-32". White. £2.50 plus 50p P&P.
1990s Tournament t-shirts/Sweat shirts.
The Subbuteo Association continued to fundraise with clothing produced for major tournaments throughout the early 1990s, and often mugs and keyrings as well. The shirts shown were offered on Subbuteoworld a few years back. The shirts show the logos that were produced for the European Championships in Germany in 1992, and England in 1996, as well as the USA World Cup of 1994 (in the middle). The World Cup logo is a real professional piece of design work, and might be more familiar to collectors for its appearance on a Lledo vintage van (see Promotional and cross-selling items). I'm not sure how involved Waddingtons were in running tournaments by this stage, so this is quite impressive.
The European Championships of 1992 were held in Hamburg. The long-sleeved sweatshirt is illustrated. The black & white illustrations of these on the UKSA paperwork never seem to do justice to these long sleeved shirts, so it is good to get a proper picture of one. The same logo was also applied to the standard t-shirt of course.
If you are an old tournament player, and have kept souvenirs from tournaments of yore, why not send them in? I'll show them off on this page.