Thursday, November 24, 2011
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Panini: Europa 80
Europa 80 was the first Panini sticker collection I can remember owning. I still have it in my possession - in fact of all my old sticker albums it's probably my most prized possession. To my astonishment, I recently discovered I'd filled 241 of the 262 spaces in the album. 'Astonishment' in that I don't remember getting so many of the stickers, plus I was only eight years old at the time and shudder at the thought of how much money my parents must have given me for the stickers. Still, there it is: a gallant effort in trying to complete my first Panini album.
Panini's first 'Euro' sticker collection coincided with UEFA's first proper European Championship. By 'proper', I mean one in which there were two groups of four competing teams playing all their games in one country. Between 1960 and 1976, the finals of the competition consisted of two semi finals and a final hosted by one nation. Hardly the sort of premise around which to base an entire sticker collection.
The 1980 UEFA European Championships changed all that. Having fought off England to host the tournament, Italy were given the dubious honour of providing the setting for games involving the likes of West Germany, Spain, Czechoslovakia, the Netherlands, Belgium, Greece, England, plus the hosts, Italy.
This was to be England's first appearance in a major tournament since Gerd Muller hooked West Germany's third quarter-final goal past Peter Bonetti in the 1970 World Cup. Ron Greenwood's side headed off to Turin with a side full of emerging talent including Kevin Keegan, Ray Clemence and Trevor Brooking. That squad, along with those of the other competing nations, were immortalised by Panini in their inaugural Euro sticker album and a fine job they made of it too.
The Front Cover
Almost square in nature and distinctively black, it featured a big action photo of Italy's Franco Causio on the ball, closely watched by Dutch defender Piet Wildschut. The album title appeared in geometric cut-out letters above a band of flags representing the competing nations and the Europa 80 official emblem in the bottom corner.
Inside Front Cover
The inside Front Cover gave details of the qualifying round results and final standings, plus the classic Panini 'List and abbreviations of the nations'. Panini sticker collectors will be familiar with this as it cropped up in all their international football albums and provided a fascinating insight into European dialects. Even to this day, whenever I hear the quiz question "Which country is sometimes known by its Latin name of Helvetia?" I can instinctively and immediately answer "Switzerland" purely because of Panini's ever-helpful abbreviation list.
Of particular note is the appearance of several countries that weren't officially recognised at the time, such as Bohemia, Estonia, Croatia and Slovakia. Not sure if it was incredibly foresight of what was to come a decade later or recognition of what had gone before some forty or more years previous.
Features
The album got off to a rip-roaring start with a fabulous map of Europe on page 1 showing where all the competing nations were located. Made up of nine stickers in a 3 x 3 grid, the completed picture was a work of art in itself.
Pages 2 and 3 were devoted to a 'European Championship Roll of Honour.' This comprised of a potted history of all the Euro tournaments up to that point, each one represented by a star player sticker and another of the winning team. All the images were in black and white.
Page 4 featured five stickers, each one relating to an important aspect of the 1980 European Championships. They depicted in turn UEFA President Artemio Franchi, the official tournament emblem (a stylised football flower), the official mascot (a wooden Pinocchio toy holding a football and wearing a paper hat), the Henri Delaunay Cup and a map of Italy showing the match locations. Alongside these was the tournament programme - a place where you could fill in the results of each match as they took place.
Page 5 provided spaces for eight stickers, specifically a city and stadia picture for each of the four venues, and these were always a great way of building up an image in your mind of what the host country would actually be like to visit in real life. Among these, the beautiful coastal view of Naples and the historic splendour of Milan Cathedral particularly stood out.
Last but not least was a mammoth seven-page spread at the back of the album featuring 14 'Excluded Nations', or to put it more appropriately, 'nations that failed to qualify'. As a concept, this seems staggering by today's standards, but you have to remember that only eight teams qualified for Europa 80. In order not to exclude most of the continent from its potential sticker-collecting duties, Panini did the decent thing and allowed five sticker spaces for the likes of East Germany, Ireland, France, Helvetia (sorry, 'Switzerland'), Yugoslavia, Hungary, Northern Ireland, Austria, Poland, Portugal, Scotland, the Soviet Union, Sweden and Wales.
It wasn't the first time Panini had done this (as we'll prove in some of our upcoming articles) and if nothing else it made real the dreams of those football fans that never thought they'd see the day when the Welsh national team featured in a Panini sticker book.
The teams
The higher profile teams (West Germany, Netherlands, England and Italy) were set out on three pages of the Europa 80 album. On these were 20 spaces for players, one for a gold foil badge and two making up a double-sized team picture. The rest (Czechoslovakia, Greece, Belgium and Spain) had two pages featuring a badge, a two-part team picture and 14 players.
The sticker spaces were decorated with a pale green surround that contained hand-drawn images of players in goalkeeping, dribbling, passing and shooting poses. Sadly for me, my eight-year-old self coloured these in with felt-tip pens, but hey - how was I to know I'd be able to sell the album on the internet for a vast cost more than 30 years later?
As for the player stickers themselves, they featured the usual high-quality colour head shots framed in light blue with the player's name, Europa 80 logo and national flag of the player's team below. Among my favourites were those of the Netherlands' Johnny Metgod (still with a full head of hair before joining Nottingham Forest), Czechoslovakia's Zdenek Nehoda (a candidate for 1980's Movember campaign if ever there was one) and England's Peter Barnes (looking like he's having a drug-induced interlude, below-the-waist ecstasy or a hangover from hell).
The Back Cover
All black once again, save for a big picture of the Europa 80 mascot in the middle and the usual array of album prices as they were across Europe at the time (15p in Great Britain's case).
Panini's first 'Euro' sticker collection coincided with UEFA's first proper European Championship. By 'proper', I mean one in which there were two groups of four competing teams playing all their games in one country. Between 1960 and 1976, the finals of the competition consisted of two semi finals and a final hosted by one nation. Hardly the sort of premise around which to base an entire sticker collection.
This was to be England's first appearance in a major tournament since Gerd Muller hooked West Germany's third quarter-final goal past Peter Bonetti in the 1970 World Cup. Ron Greenwood's side headed off to Turin with a side full of emerging talent including Kevin Keegan, Ray Clemence and Trevor Brooking. That squad, along with those of the other competing nations, were immortalised by Panini in their inaugural Euro sticker album and a fine job they made of it too.
The Front Cover
Almost square in nature and distinctively black, it featured a big action photo of Italy's Franco Causio on the ball, closely watched by Dutch defender Piet Wildschut. The album title appeared in geometric cut-out letters above a band of flags representing the competing nations and the Europa 80 official emblem in the bottom corner.
Inside Front Cover
The inside Front Cover gave details of the qualifying round results and final standings, plus the classic Panini 'List and abbreviations of the nations'. Panini sticker collectors will be familiar with this as it cropped up in all their international football albums and provided a fascinating insight into European dialects. Even to this day, whenever I hear the quiz question "Which country is sometimes known by its Latin name of Helvetia?" I can instinctively and immediately answer "Switzerland" purely because of Panini's ever-helpful abbreviation list.
Of particular note is the appearance of several countries that weren't officially recognised at the time, such as Bohemia, Estonia, Croatia and Slovakia. Not sure if it was incredibly foresight of what was to come a decade later or recognition of what had gone before some forty or more years previous.
The album got off to a rip-roaring start with a fabulous map of Europe on page 1 showing where all the competing nations were located. Made up of nine stickers in a 3 x 3 grid, the completed picture was a work of art in itself.
Pages 2 and 3 were devoted to a 'European Championship Roll of Honour.' This comprised of a potted history of all the Euro tournaments up to that point, each one represented by a star player sticker and another of the winning team. All the images were in black and white.
Page 4 featured five stickers, each one relating to an important aspect of the 1980 European Championships. They depicted in turn UEFA President Artemio Franchi, the official tournament emblem (a stylised football flower), the official mascot (a wooden Pinocchio toy holding a football and wearing a paper hat), the Henri Delaunay Cup and a map of Italy showing the match locations. Alongside these was the tournament programme - a place where you could fill in the results of each match as they took place.
Page 5 provided spaces for eight stickers, specifically a city and stadia picture for each of the four venues, and these were always a great way of building up an image in your mind of what the host country would actually be like to visit in real life. Among these, the beautiful coastal view of Naples and the historic splendour of Milan Cathedral particularly stood out.
It wasn't the first time Panini had done this (as we'll prove in some of our upcoming articles) and if nothing else it made real the dreams of those football fans that never thought they'd see the day when the Welsh national team featured in a Panini sticker book.
The higher profile teams (West Germany, Netherlands, England and Italy) were set out on three pages of the Europa 80 album. On these were 20 spaces for players, one for a gold foil badge and two making up a double-sized team picture. The rest (Czechoslovakia, Greece, Belgium and Spain) had two pages featuring a badge, a two-part team picture and 14 players.
The sticker spaces were decorated with a pale green surround that contained hand-drawn images of players in goalkeeping, dribbling, passing and shooting poses. Sadly for me, my eight-year-old self coloured these in with felt-tip pens, but hey - how was I to know I'd be able to sell the album on the internet for a vast cost more than 30 years later?
The Back Cover
All black once again, save for a big picture of the Europa 80 mascot in the middle and the usual array of album prices as they were across Europe at the time (15p in Great Britain's case).
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Thanks(giving) for a special group of seniors
 |
| Derek Dennis, Wayne Tribue, Pat Boyle, John Palumbo are among the seniors on the OL. |
On the subjects of how quickly time passes and Thanksgiving Day remembrances, we have reached a perfect confluence of that and the Temple University football seniors.
One more win and this is the greatest senior class ever.
Some highlights of this class:
- The 2011 Owl seniors are the winningest four-year class in school history.
- All but two members of the starting offensive line are seniors.
- They are the first class in school history to be bowl eligible in three consecutive years.
- They have won more conference games than any other class in school history
- They have recorded three consecutive winning seasons and out-scored opponents in four straight seasons.
Friday is going to be a sad day for me because I will be seeing a group of seniors wear a Temple uniform for the last time.
It is a reminder of how fleeting life is and how so many players have come and gone but the legacy of this group already is very impressive.
So I'm officially depressed.
What do I usually do when I'm depressed?
Eat a gallon of non-fat yogart?
No.
I'm going to play the lottery on Thursday night, Match 6. Since the numbers only go 1-49, I'm picking the numbers of each of the senior starters on defense (sorry, Morkeith Brown and Stephen Johnson, you are No. 85 and 53) plus two guys on offense. Adrian Robinson (43), Tahir Whitehead (2), Kee-Ayre Griffin (20), Kevin Kroboth (37), Joey Jones (26) and Rod Streater (18). If 2-18-20-26-37-43 come up, I win $900,000 and it'll take a little sting off the next day.
Even as a near-millionaire, there's still going to be some sadness.
This year will be even more depressing because the group includes the following names: TE Matt Balasavage (Lancaster, Pa.), DE Morris Blueford (Chesapeake, Va.), OL Pat Boyle (Towson, Md.), DE Morkeith Brown (Harrisburg, Pa.), OL Derek Dennis (Peekskill, N.Y.), DB Kee-ayre Griffin (East Orange, N.J.), LB Stephen Johnson (Norristown, Pa.), WR Joe Jones (Hollywood, Fla.), DB Kevin Kroboth (Nazareth, Pa.), OL John Palumbo (Lyndhurst, N.J.), DB Deonte Parker (Lakeland, Fla.), DE Adrian Robinson (Harrisburg, Pa.), TE Evan Rodriguez (North Bergen, N.J.), OL Jeremy Schonbrunner (Salisbury, Md.), QB Chester Stewart (Hanover, Md.), WR Rod Streater (Burlington, N.J.), OL Wayne Tribue (York, Pa.), LB Quinten White (Philadelphia, Pa.), and LB Tahir Whitehead (Newark, N.J.).
A personal note about a couple of guys.
I feel bad for Rod Streater because I feel he fits the profile of one of those "explosive" players who can make big plays down the field. Same with Joey Jones, who was one of Al Golden's first-high profile recruits out of South Florida. Not getting the ball to Streats and Jones enough at Bowling Green probably cost the Owls a win there.
Adrian Robinson was a four-year starter and MVP of the Big 33 game and defensive MVP of the MAC. He set a terrific example for the Owls behind him by forgoing the pros this year and staying his senior year
Kee-Ayre Griffin was the subject of the only email Al Golden ever sent me. I congratulated Al on his first recruiting class and Al wrote back: "Mike, thanks, but we're going after a guy right now from St. Peter's Prep in North Jersey who would really big a big get. Wish us luck." That guy is Kee-Ayre Griffin, who finally found his way here and was part of the building process from Day One. He was the last recruit of Golden's first year.I'll never forget the joy on the face of Morkeith Brown at the bowl selection party and how the entire team surrounded him in celebration (see upper right corner of the logo at the top of the page).
Adrian Robinson was a four-year starter and MVP of the Big 33 game and defensive MVP of the MAC. He set a terrific example for the Owls behind him by forgoing the pros this year and staying his senior year. The pros will always been there and Robinson enhanced his draft status by staying. You only have four years in college. Cherish them and use all four of them.
Derek "Bone-Crusher" Dennis was a stalwart on the second-best offensive line I've ever seen at Temple and has completely erased the memory of him being the only Temple player in history to tackle another Temple player in the open field (at Army, 2008). Well, maybe not completely because it is a pretty funny memory (and a heckuva tackle of Adam DiMichele, by the way).
I'm going to miss them all, whether they make me a millionaire or not on Thanksgiving.
A special message from Hooter:
Monday, November 21, 2011
Benkin makes TU football fun to listen to again
Ron Menchine (left) and Dave Sims were terrific announcers for Temple football.
We take a break from all of this bowl talk (about five days premature, if you ask me) to get something off my chest that has been bugging me for over 20 years.
As a kid, I used to love listening to Harry Kalas do the Phillies and Charlie Swift and, later, Merrill Reese do the Eagles.
Some of my greatest sports moments have come from Harry the K saying "there is it, the No. 500 home run for Michael Jack Schmidt" and literally hearing the tears stream down his face over the enormity of the moment.
Ron Menchine was a terrific announcer for Temple back in the day as well.
 |
| Ed Benkin and I have only one thing in common and that is a face for radio. Hire this guy immediately. |
I didn't know who Bronco Nagurski was at the time but I knew he must have been good because Ron Menchine said so.
Dave Sims, now at Westwood One, was a superb play-by-play guy for Temple in the 1990 season.
I miss Harry Kalas very much and I still enjoy Merrill, but our own Harry (Donahue) comes up small in comparison.
Very small.
Too much of this: "Owls make the tackle. There's a fumble. Temple recovers! No check that, they didn't.." Or: "The ball is INTERCEPTED! No, dropped."
Or calling Temple's kicker Bernard McManus. Or calling a bone-jarring hit a jone-barring hit.
I could go on and on but there is only so much bandwidth on the internet.
The last 20-plus years as a Temple fan have been a silent spring for me.
I try to avoid the radio as much as possible because it is just too frustrating to listen to anymore. Steve Joachim, I like. I know some people can't take Steve but I think he knows offensive football inside and out and I don't mind hearing his perspective.
Then Harry Donahue took a trip to Puerto Rico with the basketball team and, all of a sudden, Temple football announcing got good again.
Ed Benkin did a terrific job in Donahue's place. He and Joachim were a nice tandem.
I don't know Ed, personally. Heck, I've never even met the guy but I know he's good. When I'm out jogging on a Saturday afternoon (and I've done that the two weeks Temple was playing on Wednesdays), I like to take my transitor radio and scoot around the dial.
I fell on some Princeton football games and thought, "who is this guy" doing the play-by-play?
He was that good.
It was no fluke he was good for Temple as well.
Benkin, a co-worker of Donahue's at KYW, did a terrific job getting the down and distance right and who had the ball and who caught it, all the first time.
Important stuff when you are the eyes and ears of the fans on the other end of the dial.
Now, do I think Benkin has a shot getting the full-time job?
No.
Harry and Temple athletic director Bill Bradshaw are long-time golfing buddies and I don't think Bradshaw would have the gonads to tell Harry to take a hike.
I hope I'm wrong for the 270K alumni who would like to have an opportunity to listen to Temple football again without throwing the radio out the window.
Those transitor radios can get pretty expensive to replace.
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Temple beats another Big East target
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| Bernard Pierce would be a wise Owl to stay and get the Heisman he just jumped over about five people to get in a top two spot next year. The pros will always be there. The Heisman is his for the taking next year. The ball girl is pretty cute. |
KYW-AM (1060) reported it this way:
"In new developments in the Penn State story, the NCAA has announced it is investigating Penn State and, it was learned, Joe Paterno has a treatable form of lung cancer."
Thanks, KYW.
Score by Quarters 1 2 3 4 ScoreI heard about the NCAA investigation on Tuesday and about Paterno's lung cancer on Thursday.
Army 0 0 7 7 14
TEMPLE 14 14 0 14 42
SCORING SUMMARY ARMY -TEMPLE
1st 12:06 TEMPLE BROWN, Matt 22 yd run (McMANUS, B. kick)
6 plays, 80 yards, TOP 2:54 0 - 7
00:26 TEMPLE PIERCE, Bernard 11 yd run (McMANUS, B. kick)
15 plays, 88 yards, TOP 7:40 0 - 14
2nd 04:30 TEMPLE PIERCE, Bernard 1 yd run (McMANUS, B. kick)
6 plays, 37 yards, TOP 3:47 0 - 21
01:07 TEMPLE JONES, Joe 36 yd pass from COYER, Chris (McMANUS, B. kick)
2 plays, 50 yards, TOP 0:18 0 - 28
3rd 02:59 ARMY Jenkins, Max 1 yd run (Carlton, Alex kick)
17 plays, 80 yards, TOP 8:08 7 - 28
4th 10:37 TEMPLE BROWN, Matt 52 yd run (McMANUS, B. kick)
1 play, 52 yards, TOP 0:09 7 - 35
07:30 ARMY Dixon, Larry 15 yd run (Carlton, Alex kick)
8 plays, 80 yards, TOP 3:07 14 - 35
05:11 TEMPLE PIERCE, Bernard 49 yd run (McMANUS, B. kick)
4 plays, 65 yards, TOP 2:13 14 - 42
By Monday, we should be hearing this:
"In college sports, Temple has just beaten Army, 42-14."
Nothing like the latest news.
This just in, though.
Temple's 42-14 win over Army represents the SECOND TIME this year that the Owls have scored 42 points against a school that was mentioned for Big East membership OVER Temple.
Hmm.
Makes you wonder, doesn't it?
Fortunately, Villanova couldn't get its stadium act together and cooler heads prevailed at West Point before the Big East found itself with those two programs.
Meanwhile, in the heart of Big East country, in the nation's fourth-largest TV market, Temple has put itself in a terrific spot to finish off another eight-plus win season for the third-straight year and it will finish averaging more than 30,000 fans per home game. TV ratings-wise, no big-city school does any better and that includes both USC and UCLA. The Owls have some marquee players, like Bernard Pierce (three touchdowns, 158 yards) and Matty Brown (two touchdowns, 133 yards). Pierce has set himself up quite nicely for a real Heisman Trophy run next year.
Wouldn't that be great, seeing Bernard Pierce in a three-piece suit at the Downtown Athletic Club, in 2012?
Paul Palmer, who was there as Heisman runnerup in 1986, also was in attendance at the Temple game today.
That's the kind of experience Bernard will remember for the rest of his life.
Let's not get ahead of ourselves here, though.
When you think that Army and Rutgers drew only 30,000 to Yankee Stadium (in the middle of both those fan bases' footprint) last week and Temple drew 25,515 today, that makes it all the more impressive.
Temple football has a lot to offer, whether that be the Big East or a bowl game. Temple led Army, 28-0, at the half. Rutgers moved into first place in the Big East with a 20-3 win over Cincinnati today. Rutgers and Army were tied, 6-6, at the half exactly one week ago.
The key thing for Temple now is finishing strong, getting that bowl bid and winning the game.
That would be a first for the program in over 30 years and news worth reporting in real time, maybe even by KYW.
Friday, November 18, 2011
Holy Grail No.1 - Subbuteo FIFA World Cup Trophy
Search for ‘holy grail’ in Google Images and the results invariably depict some glorious, shimmering, golden cup. There’s also a fair few Monty Python images too, but we’ll skip those. Search in the Football Attic, however, and the results are...well, pretty much the same. As for me, my personal holy grail (actually one of many, but we’ll cover some others later) was also an object of golden beauty, but rather than having once been cradled by the Messiah, this was more likely to have been manhandled by a Saturday worker at the local toy shop. My holiest of grails was the Subbuteo World Cup Trophy (officially known as C182) and it was a quest that was to last many, many years... until eBay popped up and made the whole ‘quest’ aspect of it somewhat redundant.
Let me take you back to 1986 and a football ambivalent 11-year-old is watching the news. “And now the sport”... Images flash up of USSR knocking six past Hungary and the Danes (what a kit!) doing likewise to Uruguay. An 11-year-old’s world is turned upside down and he is instantly hooked.
So some weeks go by, some more matches are played and eventually the object of my desire is held aloft in the Azteca. Only, it wasn’t yet an object of desire: the obsession had not yet taken hold. Yes, I had fallen in love with the trophy, a love affair that continues undiminished til this day, but the seed for my infatuation had only just been planted. The obsession began as that trophy, the one that had sat in the display case of Barnby’s window for years, the one I had dismissed as ugly and ‘not a proper cup’ while admiring the European Cup for its undeniable cupliness, the one I would now cherish after purchasing it from said shop the first Saturday after the tournament had finished, became that trophy that was NO LONGER AVAILABLE!!! Apparently, in their wisdom, the makers of Subbuteo had decided - in a World Cup year - that they would no longer produce the World Cup Trophy. Let me just repeat that: no longer produce a World Cup trophy in a World Cup Year. I know!
And so began the obsession: the decline into insanity that saw me, every Saturday, trudging up to that same toy shop, past the toy guns, past the Airfix models and straight to the back where all the flick-to-kick paraphernalia was kept, but no - it was not to be.
I’m not sure if you remember, but there used to be a world with no internet. No Google, no eBay... no blogs about football tat. Hard to recall isn’t it? Well, now imagine trying to track down a discontinued toy that was only ever produced for a few years and that no-one really seemed to care about. Not even the Yellow Pages could help Oh yeah, help the narcissistic fly fishing author, but not an 11-year-old with a perfectly healthy fixation on a small piece of shiny plastic! 'Not just there for the bad things in life'? LIES!
Time passed and as with all unrequited loves, the feelings only grew stronger, but then... a lifeline! Woolworths were on the verge of moving shops and as such had a lot of old stock they were getting rid of. One such item was a Subbuteo set complete with World Cup Trophy. (I’ve just researched this and I could have sworn the set I saw was called The International Edition, but that never seems to have been boxed with C182 - rather the Jules Rimet Trophy. This one definitely had the WCT in it though (no it wasn’t the World Cup Edition as I remember it being an edition I’d never heard of and I had the '86 Subbuteo catalogue poster)).
So, obviously this story ends here right? I bought it, stared at it for ages and my life was complete (albeit missing an Argentina home kit from 1986, but as complete as possible. Of course a Denmark '86 kit would have been nice too...Where was I?!?)
Wrong!
This was 1987, I was getting about 50p a week pocket money and my parents didn’t believe in the DFS model of purchasing, at least not for their spendalot son. I’d therefore have to save for 16 weeks. I’m sure you can all see what’s coming here... yes, by the time I had enough cash (or rather a few weeks before as my parents weren’t that cruel), I marched into Woolworths to be greeted with the inevitable empty shelf and once again my life fell apart.
And that’s when I resigned myself to never owning one. My first taste of true defeat. Years of therapy would have to take the place of that warm glow I’d have received from its shiny, plastic embrace.
Except someone went and invented the internet and someone else thought an online car boot sale would also be a good idea. In turn, I thought both of these were great ideas! I was now in my late-20s, I had a job, a house, a car, a family... but there was still something missing. Some might suggest it was the ability to grow up, but they are but soulless fools. "Subbuteo World Cup”...*click*
“Holy something or other! How much?”
After several near misses and a few ‘out of my price range’s, I finally snared one... £27 for a ‘paint slightly faded’ example. By slightly faded, they meant ‘virtually non-existent’, but I finally had one.
paint 'slightly faded'...
So did I feel complete? Was my search finally over? No, obviously not - as I said I was in my late-20s, I had a job, a house, a car and a family. Besides, the finish was poor and the base a bit wonky. I needed a better one!
I now have three. One was less than a tenner and was immaculate - until the postman squashed it through the letterbox and cracked the base! My last was more costly, but came in the original box, so, between the three of them, I now have an immaculate boxed trophy with a perfectly intact base and a wife who just doesn’t even bother trying to understand certain aspects of me anymore.
The Threesome
Let me take you back to 1986 and a football ambivalent 11-year-old is watching the news. “And now the sport”... Images flash up of USSR knocking six past Hungary and the Danes (what a kit!) doing likewise to Uruguay. An 11-year-old’s world is turned upside down and he is instantly hooked.
So some weeks go by, some more matches are played and eventually the object of my desire is held aloft in the Azteca. Only, it wasn’t yet an object of desire: the obsession had not yet taken hold. Yes, I had fallen in love with the trophy, a love affair that continues undiminished til this day, but the seed for my infatuation had only just been planted. The obsession began as that trophy, the one that had sat in the display case of Barnby’s window for years, the one I had dismissed as ugly and ‘not a proper cup’ while admiring the European Cup for its undeniable cupliness, the one I would now cherish after purchasing it from said shop the first Saturday after the tournament had finished, became that trophy that was NO LONGER AVAILABLE!!! Apparently, in their wisdom, the makers of Subbuteo had decided - in a World Cup year - that they would no longer produce the World Cup Trophy. Let me just repeat that: no longer produce a World Cup trophy in a World Cup Year. I know!
And so began the obsession: the decline into insanity that saw me, every Saturday, trudging up to that same toy shop, past the toy guns, past the Airfix models and straight to the back where all the flick-to-kick paraphernalia was kept, but no - it was not to be.
I’m not sure if you remember, but there used to be a world with no internet. No Google, no eBay... no blogs about football tat. Hard to recall isn’t it? Well, now imagine trying to track down a discontinued toy that was only ever produced for a few years and that no-one really seemed to care about. Not even the Yellow Pages could help Oh yeah, help the narcissistic fly fishing author, but not an 11-year-old with a perfectly healthy fixation on a small piece of shiny plastic! 'Not just there for the bad things in life'? LIES!
Time passed and as with all unrequited loves, the feelings only grew stronger, but then... a lifeline! Woolworths were on the verge of moving shops and as such had a lot of old stock they were getting rid of. One such item was a Subbuteo set complete with World Cup Trophy. (I’ve just researched this and I could have sworn the set I saw was called The International Edition, but that never seems to have been boxed with C182 - rather the Jules Rimet Trophy. This one definitely had the WCT in it though (no it wasn’t the World Cup Edition as I remember it being an edition I’d never heard of and I had the '86 Subbuteo catalogue poster)).
So, obviously this story ends here right? I bought it, stared at it for ages and my life was complete (albeit missing an Argentina home kit from 1986, but as complete as possible. Of course a Denmark '86 kit would have been nice too...Where was I?!?)
Wrong!
This was 1987, I was getting about 50p a week pocket money and my parents didn’t believe in the DFS model of purchasing, at least not for their spendalot son. I’d therefore have to save for 16 weeks. I’m sure you can all see what’s coming here... yes, by the time I had enough cash (or rather a few weeks before as my parents weren’t that cruel), I marched into Woolworths to be greeted with the inevitable empty shelf and once again my life fell apart.
And that’s when I resigned myself to never owning one. My first taste of true defeat. Years of therapy would have to take the place of that warm glow I’d have received from its shiny, plastic embrace.
Except someone went and invented the internet and someone else thought an online car boot sale would also be a good idea. In turn, I thought both of these were great ideas! I was now in my late-20s, I had a job, a house, a car, a family... but there was still something missing. Some might suggest it was the ability to grow up, but they are but soulless fools. "Subbuteo World Cup”...*click*
“Holy something or other! How much?”
After several near misses and a few ‘out of my price range’s, I finally snared one... £27 for a ‘paint slightly faded’ example. By slightly faded, they meant ‘virtually non-existent’, but I finally had one.
paint 'slightly faded'...So did I feel complete? Was my search finally over? No, obviously not - as I said I was in my late-20s, I had a job, a house, a car and a family. Besides, the finish was poor and the base a bit wonky. I needed a better one!
I now have three. One was less than a tenner and was immaculate - until the postman squashed it through the letterbox and cracked the base! My last was more costly, but came in the original box, so, between the three of them, I now have an immaculate boxed trophy with a perfectly intact base and a wife who just doesn’t even bother trying to understand certain aspects of me anymore.
The Threesome
Thursday, November 17, 2011
MAC Blogger Roundtable Week 11
This week's host is Mike Trumbell of The Chip Report, a Central Michigan blog.
His questions are followed by my answers:
1) CMU's head coach, Dan Enos, complained about his team's schedule
and playing 3 conference games in 12 days. Give your opinions on why
lopsided MAC scheduling continues to happen.
TFF: Luck of the draw. I've talked to some of the guys on the team about the two nine-day layoffs for the Owls and they all want to play every week, spaced out equally, but would do not object to games breaking up the boredom of late-season practices. I'm sure the league is going to try to spread out this kind of scheduling so that every team takes a turn.
2) Do these basketball scores Toledo and NIU have been putting up
reflect positively or negatively on the MAC?
TFF: I think positively. It was the water-cooler talk the next day in work and I'm sure just not at my place. So much for defense wins championships.
3) What are your thoughts on the weekday, ESPN MAC schedule? Does TV
exposure outweigh attendance?
TFF: I think the TV exposure has been great for the MAC, since most of the games have been highly competitive.
4) What play has made the biggest difference (positive or negative) in
your respective team's season?
TFF: Brazil's bobbled catch at Ohio that was ruled a completion. Replays showed he never had control AND was out of bounds, but mysteriously replay official refused to overturn the call. That was a negative play. Positive play was Temple quarterback Chester Stewart calling a confused timeout after two failed series in Ohio, earning him a permanent seat on the bench and perhaps sparing Temple a four-game losing streak to close out the season.
Rank em:
1) Northern Illinois
2) Toledo
3) Ohio
4) Temple
5) Western Michigan
6) Ball State
7) Eastern Michigan
8) Bowling Green
9) Central Michigan
10) Miami
11) Kent State
12) Buffalo
13) Akron
His questions are followed by my answers:
1) CMU's head coach, Dan Enos, complained about his team's schedule
and playing 3 conference games in 12 days. Give your opinions on why
lopsided MAC scheduling continues to happen.
TFF: Luck of the draw. I've talked to some of the guys on the team about the two nine-day layoffs for the Owls and they all want to play every week, spaced out equally, but would do not object to games breaking up the boredom of late-season practices. I'm sure the league is going to try to spread out this kind of scheduling so that every team takes a turn.
2) Do these basketball scores Toledo and NIU have been putting up
reflect positively or negatively on the MAC?
TFF: I think positively. It was the water-cooler talk the next day in work and I'm sure just not at my place. So much for defense wins championships.
3) What are your thoughts on the weekday, ESPN MAC schedule? Does TV
exposure outweigh attendance?
TFF: I think the TV exposure has been great for the MAC, since most of the games have been highly competitive.
4) What play has made the biggest difference (positive or negative) in
your respective team's season?
TFF: Brazil's bobbled catch at Ohio that was ruled a completion. Replays showed he never had control AND was out of bounds, but mysteriously replay official refused to overturn the call. That was a negative play. Positive play was Temple quarterback Chester Stewart calling a confused timeout after two failed series in Ohio, earning him a permanent seat on the bench and perhaps sparing Temple a four-game losing streak to close out the season.
Rank em:
1) Northern Illinois
2) Toledo
3) Ohio
4) Temple
5) Western Michigan
6) Ball State
7) Eastern Michigan
8) Bowling Green
9) Central Michigan
10) Miami
11) Kent State
12) Buffalo
13) Akron
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