| Peter Upton's |
Subbuteo Tribute Website. |
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Here we go again with the What's New page for 2025. Anything updated or added to the site over the next twelve months will feature here.
This is the sixth year of planned monthly updates for this website, which was first founded in the late 1990s. Surprisingly, new information on old products shows no signs of slowing up. I have lots of things still sitting in my picture files, but as usual it is stuff that other collectors send in that are the stars of the show.
If you have been using the 2024 updates page to navigate the website, this has joined the 2020 Updates; 2021 Updates, 2022 Updates and 2023 Updates in the archives. That's a lot of updates. Follow the links to find all the stuff you may have missed if you've not visited for a while.....
As always, 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, a big annual Subbuteo Festival, and a very impressive World Cup staged in Subbuteo's spiritual home of Tunbridge Wells. 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.
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).
Note that due to requests, the What's New page is arranged so the latest updates will always be at the top of the page.
Updates for January 2025.
We'll start the year with one of the more interesting subjects for heavyweight collectors - the named box sides. Italian collector Gianluca Grementieri of website vintagesubbuteo.com kindly provided pictures of two teams from his collection. One is a version of the Stockport team that was already shown as a possible named side on this website. Here, it has the correct named box, and as before the colours look real enough. The second is a named Northampton Town as shown on the Celtic Dream website, with a solitary chest hoop along with collar and cuffs. This was previously mentioned on my website but not illustrated. It's an odd one, and Gianluca's team is in such lovely condition that you worry that it could be a repaint... but the hair/boots are the correct shade, and the glue in the base is clearly vintage. As always, these un-catalogued teams come with a degree of caution.
Looking at modern kit websites would indicate that Northampton Town never wore a single hoop like this. Of course, Subbuteo Sports Games did not have access to such resources, and it is instructive to look at contemporary sources for possible reasons for production. I looked at the 1970s Observers books a couple of years ago, and another useful source seems to be "The Hotspur Handy Book of Football Club Colours" produced by DC Thomson in 1969. This pamphlet features both the Stockport and the single hoop Northampton Town. Is this where the error came in?
More nice usage of heavyweight players, this time in rugby colours thanks to Mark Skellon. Lovely to see R9 Bradford Northern finally appear in this figure (and isn't he beautiful?). Elsewhere, there is R37 Widnes with white sock tops to match an already illustrated kicker. This has football bases, as happened with the final h/w releases (the rugby bases ran out). Like the football based Wales side that set I own, this has black inners and the horrible late 1970s glue (so probably rattlers galore!). The R20 Leeds lightweight is also from Mark's collection. It seems to suit that figure very well. I'm very envious!
Slightly more mundane among rugby sides might be sock variations. Both Ashley and I have the R3 Scotland with all blue socks, but Ashley's R4 Ireland in all green socks on chunky figures is new to me. The catalogues don't list sock colours, but as teams were painted to a reference figure, variations like this don't seem to be that common.
It was useful having two sets of eyes at the recent Subbuteo exhibition at Tunbridge Wells museum. Ashley photographed this flyer, after I missed it! It advertised the Schoolboys' Own Exhibition of 1952 (Dec 31st 1951-12th Jan 1952), and the Subbuteo Sports Games stall that was going to be there (selling football and cricket games and accessories). Not a leaflet I had seen in the wild.
There are pictures online of other Subbuteo stalls at the Schoolboys' Own Exhibitions, and I'll try to bring them onto the site in the next few months.
On the same page I've added this early order form. Dating from the late 1940s when the price of the assembly edition had increased to 10s 7d (inc 1s 10d purchase tax and 6d postage). The orders were still sent to "The Lodge" which was the Adolph family home, so I was slightly amused by the text running up the side of the form which says "Please write any remarks you may wish to make on the back of this Order Form as a separate letter is apt to confuse our dispatch department." Was the dispatch department Peter Adolph or his mother? Or perhaps he was starting to take on staff as sales grew.
Those of us who like to display our collections (or even just dust them off and enjoy them), still seem to be finding previously un-noticed variations. Here is an alternative green fence half-time scoreboard that not only features the individual letter stickers from the red fence version, but is actually longer with a different moulding (count the green post tops for starters!). Regular site visitors will probably be diving into their collections to check this out! A great spot from eagle-eyed Ashley Hemming.
More variation! In my article on C133 Interchangeable Goalkeepers I showed three eras of addresses for SSG, but suggested that a Hobby Crest box did not seem to exist. Wrong again. Well done to Phil Eccles who found that he owned exactly that - a Tonbridge address box with the late 1970s crest. As the Jockey capped goalkeepers arrive in this set in 1978, this must have been a very short-lived box. Time to check that collection again!
On the same page, C136 The Subbuteo Sound only had a small catalogue picture because... well because it's a bit rubbish. However, some nice pictures have turned up, and as I actually own a copy it was easy to add a little of the (excessive) blurb from the back of the sleeve for extra cheap laughs. Ho, Ho, Ho, Subbuteo indeed.
La Leggenda Partwork; la leggenda platinum edition
We're slowly filling up the Italian partwork pages with the accessories supplied with or alongside the three partworks. The replica brown scoreboard is lovely (even without floodlights!), although I probably have too many of the original... Still the new competition cards featuring global tournaments are desirable. I hadn't seen the magazine folders produced for the first partwork before, which are an attractive addition to your shelves, although most of the stock of this partwork in the UK came without the magazines and you needed to understand Italian to get much from them.
Here is a goal from the original partwork. I've probably got pictures of the various balls issued with this series if I check my files.
Promotional and cross-selling - Waddintons Top Trumps Promotional card (1992).
The little promotional set that arrived on site last month reminded me of this advertisement card that Waddingtons included in various Top Trumps packs in 1992. A really suitable piece of cross-selling for this particular pack of European Club Football.
21st century branded products - University Games cardboard stand-up.
This should probably be on the Promotional page, but there isn't any modern stuff on there. This is a full sized cardboard stand-up figure, with a hole to insert your head "saucy seaside photo" style. This one was at the Tunbridge Wells shopping centre during last year's World Cup, and is modelled by my good friend Ian. I ended up packing this into a van at the end of the event - but sadly not my van, and it was too big to run off with! A great addition to any Subbuteo room surely?
When I was adding the Newfooty rules to the website I forgot to include this extra oversize yellow sheet which featured hand-drawn illustrations of "Six Easy Lessons" in play. I have it in one of the bigger deluxe "with pitch" editions, but it isn't in any of the smaller sets that I used to produce the pages. So well done Ashley for reminding me of it. Also included is the final Crestlin Limited rulebook cover, just for completeness, although I believe it is otherwise the same as the previous W L Keeling and Sons issue. None of my sets are Crestlin issue, which came right at the end of the run.
How much minutiae is too much? I've swapped out Ashley's picture of three coloured rugby balls for his new photograph showing four. I think casual collectors are going to be happy with the original two ball split (brown and orange), but perhaps ball collectors need more? The different ones look distinctive when displayed like this. In addition, there wasn't a good picture of the kicking fullback "rest" which was provided with the early rugby kickers. That allows a little extra justification for this picture of rests in two shades of green plastic. Are we disappearing down the rabbit hole here? I'm aware the site has always had cricket stumps in "white, off-white, cream and yellow", so obsessive is in my nature. We do have a lot more exciting finds to come this year honestly!!
Updates for December 2024.
I've left a couple of items from last year on here - the promotional item because I'm hoping for more details to emerge, and Tommy Spot because he isn't anywhere else on the website as yet!
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?
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.
The Subbuteo News Section.
I've left my local club in the News section. If you have a club that wants a little extra free publicity in this way then please feel free to send in the details.
Otherwise, check out the English Subbuteo Association website for details of clubs in the British isles.
The Worthing Five-Star Table Football Club.
The Worthing Five-Star Table Football Club have a regular weekly meet at The Heene Road Community Centre in Worthing, using four lovely new pitches. The club has been active since 1981, and has always had a lovely, friendly vibe. There are a couple of leagues this year, so something for most levels of skill, plus some historic cup competitions, and WASPA events.
Longshore's Official Subbuteo Products.
If you are a casual visitor, you might not be aware that there is a current Subbuteo range in the UK (and elsewhere). The range is a modern spin on things, but is actually a decent place for youngsters to start out. The sad thing is the low profile that these products have, especially on the High Street.
The license holders are a Hong Kong based company called Longshore, and the UK distributor is University Games (who merged with the previous UK distributor Paul Lamond). There are a range of box sets priced at around £40. These are similar, but include official Liverpool, England, and England Women sets.
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 players are a flexible rubbery plastic, which means less breakages than in olden days! We certainly had fun with these sets at the Family Fun Day at the Tunbridge Wells World Cup.
The last couple of years of production have firmed up a UK team range (shown above), and added accessories like a deluxe pitch, a training set, and a scoreboard/timer. It just needs to get noticed a bit more!
The official Subbuteo website is worth a look, as it does have a few details from production elsewhere in the world. Away from the UK there is an Italian/Greek range, a French/Belgian set and a Portuguese version, although to be honest, the differences are minimal. However, Eleven Force the Spanish distributor, have a history of producing unique sets, so it will be interesting to see if they keep that going. There is now a distributor in New Zealand (Findlays), and the distributor in Italy Rocco Giocattoli have an Astropitch and a Roma team available among the more standard stuff.
New Books.
1. Land of the Giants - My Journey through the World of Table Soccer by Derek Air
Published in 2024 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!
2. Illustrated World Football Almanac for Subbuteo players and collectors by Roberto Gigli
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
3. "HEIM-SPIEL Tischfußball im vordigitalen Zeitalter" ("Home Game. Table Football in the Pre-Digital Age") by Hans-Peter Hock.
A quick mention for a third 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.
Table Soccer News.
My article on the competitive side of Table Soccer hadn't been updated for a while, and serious Table Soccer 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 be able to 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.
The Updated Wobbly Hobby Shop Website.
The full Wobbly Hobby Shop experience is now available. The updated site is a joy to use, so it is even easier for UK customers to obtain the Tchaaa4 range of high performance table soccer products. There is also a full range of the cheaper Sureshot bases, which are a great starting point for the modern game, along with a wide selection of other modern table soccer products. There are also blank players for painting, and some vintage stock.
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 house extensions, 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....
There continue to be 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....
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.
Colin's existing Zeugo team colours website has been incorporated into the new version. I've hopefully amended all the links on this site!
Moments in time (a series) (No 7).
*The Swedish teams as shown in the 1981 Italian catalogue.
1976 - Sweden
| Pos | Allsvenskan. | Ref No |
| 1 | Halmstads BK | 292 |
| 2 | Malmo FF | 005 |
| 3 | Osters IF | 285 |
| 4 | Landskrona BoIS | 287 |
| 5 | Orebro SK | 290 |
| 6 | Kalmar FF | 289 |
| 7 | AIK Solna | 282 |
| 8 | Hammarby IF | 283 |
| 9 | IFK Norrkoping | 293 |
| 10 | IF Elfsborg | 284 |
| 11 | Djurgardens | 288 |
| 12 | IFK Sundsvall | 291 |
| 13 | Atividabergs FF (relegated) | 149 |
| 14 | Orgryte IS (relegated) | 286 |
As many website visitors will be aware, the official UK numerical team range expanded hugely in the 1978 catalogue, with many new European leagues added. However, many of the teams had been produced for their local markets before their UK appearance, and it is instructive to look at the actual leagues of the time to see when the team colours were first drawn up.
Last year a previously unknown heavyweight from the Finnish top flight came to light, and research on the teams in the UK catalogues showed that 1975 must have been the initial start date for Finland. For Sweden, it was a year later, i.e. 1976. As with Finland and Portugal, the teams produced in Subbuteo were simply that year's top flight.
With Malmo already mentioned in Subbuteo catalogues under reference five, it is interesting to note that nearly all the rest of the league was given new reference numbers, with only relegated Atividabergs deemed similar enough to an existing reference (149). Whilst AIK and Djurgardens do have classic club colours, in reality, most of these teams played in relatively plain kits, with some just sock trim away from established Subbuteo sides. The generic nature of these kits did at least mean that many were also offered as alternatives for lower league UK sides at various times (for example - 283 Hull City; 286 York City; 287 Notts County; 289 Barnsley etc) meaning that many of these teams are not as rare as the more eccentric Finland or Portugal sides from the same catalogues.
As usual with these simple snapshot productions there were winners and losers. There are always minnows who sneak in, and more historic names who miss out. The lucky side here was IFK Sundsvall who actually had their first ever top flight season in 1976. They managed five seasons in the top flight between 1976 and 1981, but haven't graced that level since. According to Wikipedia, their average attendance seems to have dipped below 100 in recent years, so they are not exactly a sleeping giant. They are not to be confused with GIF Sundsvall who have made slightly more regular appearances in the Swedish top flight (nineteen seasons since 1965). Both teams seem to favour blue and white kits though.
The biggest loser on the heavyweight lists was probably the historic Gothenburg team GAIS who were relegated from the top flight in 1975, thus beginning a thirty year period of mostly lower league football. Oddly, they share their club colours with the recently discovered heavyweight Finland side Pyrkiva Turku, wearing green and black striped shirts with white shorts (albeit usually with white socks).
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.