FOCUS ON... SUBBUTEO
Most boys who were born after March 1947 will have at some time either owned or known someone who owned a Subbuteo Table Football set. Its inventor, Peter Adolph, wanted to call his newly invented football game ‘The Hobby’ but was prevented by the patenting office, so opted for the next best thing ‘Subbuteo’, derived from ‘Falco Subbuteo’, the Latin name for the bird of prey, the Hobby. The first sets produced by Adolph were made by him with the help of his mother and had goals of wire and cardboard with cardboard figures attached to button bases with lead washer weights. In the early sets, indeed until the early 1960s, the game did not include a pitch, the pitch being drawn on an old army blanket with piece of chalk to dimensions supplied. Later the figures were made from celluloid, the bases became plastic and eventually the OO scale ‘Continental’ 3D figures became the norm after their introduction in 1961.
Subbuteo Heavyweight Teams Boxed, includes numbers 7 West Ham United, 18 Tottenham Hotspur, 40 Crystal Palace, 100 Manchester United, 102 Crystal Palace and 119 Everton. All in clean boxes. Sold for £70, Mullock’s, March.
Subbuteo Heavyweight Teams Boxed, includes Numbers 6 Hull City, 9 Sunderland, 17 Sheffield Wednesday, 22 Sheffield Wednesday, 47 Southport and 208 Leeds United. All in clean boxes. Sold for £90, Mullock’s, March.
Subbuteo Heavyweight Teams Boxed, includes numbers 1 Barnsley, 2 Everton, 5 Manchester City, 8 Newcastle United, 21 Leeds United, 41 Liverpool, 171 Middlesbrough, 189 Peterborough and two other teams. All in clean boxes. Sold for £130, Mullock’s, March.
Subbuteo Heavyweight Teams Boxed, includes numbers 11 QPR, 23 Bradford City, 31 Blackburn Rovers, 51 Brighton and 79 West Ham United. All in clean boxes. Sold for £100, Mullock’s, March.
Subbuteo Heavyweight European/England Teams Boxed, includes Numbers 13 Holland, 19 Barcelona, 50 Brazil, 154 England, 156 West Germany, 166 Italy together with blue & white boxed 317 England and 319 Wales. All in clean boxes. Sold for £70, Mullock’s, March.
Subbuteo Lightweight European Teams Boxed, includes numbers 768 Germany, 057 Milan Wattenscheid, 415 Italy, 403 Cameroon, 763 Kaiserslautern, 764 Eintracht Frankfurt, 681
West Germany, 666 Racing Club De Paris,
766 Borussia M’Gladbach, 472 Barcelona, 783 Grasshoppers, 689 Holland, 058 Inter Atalanta and 696 USSR. Sold for £200, Mullock’s, March.
Subbuteo Heavyweight European Teams Boxed, includes Numbers 56 Ajax, 139 Lyons, 152 Bulgaria, 157 Mexico and 163 Uruguay. All in clean boxes. Sold for £180, Mullock’s, March.
Subbuteo Heavyweight Scottish Teams Boxed, includes numbers 25 Celtic, 27 Arbroath, 45 Hibernian, 49 Dundee United, 81 Clyde and 318 Scotland. All in clean boxes. Sold for £110, Mullock’s, March.
Subbuteo Heavyweight Teams Boxed, includes numbers 3 West Bromwich Albion, 4 Stoke City, 10 Derby County, 16 Arsenal, 28 Norwich City, 42 Chelsea, 43 Coventry City, 74 Aston Villa, 77 Wolves and 101 Birmingham City. All in clean boxes. Sold for £120, Mullock’s, March.