27 Jun 2008
All the accessories required for that big match atmosphere
Hey pop pickers, I’d aimed to leave the all-time classics until the home stretch, but an overwhelming urge just came over me to add All I Want For Christmas Is A Dukla Prague Away Kit to the site. Perhaps the most famous HMHB song of all, and the one which launched a thousand replica shirts. Does anything else need to be said about this?
Update: it’s getting a few mentions, not surprisingly, in Name your favourite football-related song on TimesOnline…
See lyrics to All I Want For Christmas Is A Dukla Prague Away Kit
53 Letters Sent:
Paul F
[edited by admin]
The lyrics for this were more correctly set out by an American chap many years ago. They include:
There was one of a game
{? Odds scale ?} Amsterdam,
The cards are down;
…
It was a dodgy transformer, again and again.
It was a dodgy transformer, again and again.
It was a dodgy blue mass, again and again.
It was a dodgy transformer, cost 3 pounds 10.
So he sent his doting mother
Up the stairs with the stepladder,
To get the {? Sub-u-dome ?}
Out of the loft.
…
And then he said he’d be right back
While taking the base from under his left-wing.
Come to half-time, you were losing, four-nil.
Each and every goal, {? are partly because of some os his ?} stupid penalties.
So you smash up the floodlights
And the game was abandoned,
And the bog would bark
And you’d be banned from his house.
…
And now he’s working
In a job with a future.
He hands me my Gyro (as in gyroscope, not “hero”)
Every two weeks.
This and more on this page at the HMHB website
Jun 30th, 2008
Bill Stow
I wonder if you would consider expanding the final word
‘transformer’ to make it ‘ transformer…er’ – just a thought as its the way its usually sung I think
Feb 16th, 2009
Lee
giro = unemployment check
massive EERRR at the end
so it “transformer EEEERRRRR”
Feb 27th, 2010
Paul
I just got an email from worldsoccershop.com, where I get my replica shirts, telling me to “show my roots with retro soccer gear.” First on their list of retro shirts was none other than a 1960s Dukla Prague away kit. Although I’m sure the reference was lost on almost everyone who got the message (and probably on the company itself, since they don’t mention HMHB anywhere on their site), I was excited to see it anyway.
Oct 6th, 2010
Vendor of Quack Nostrums
Just noticed that we’ve got the lyrics written as ‘A dodgy transformer that cost three pound ten.’
Now given that NB57 may well be looking back at an event which took place during the halcyonic days of his childhood, I feel that it is important to establish whether or not this was before or after Monday 15 February 1971.
Does ‘three pound ten’ mean £3 and 10 pence (as we’d now know it) or £3 and 10 shillings, in which case the transformer cost £3.50.
Forty pence difference was worth a lot of money in them days. I knew decimalisation would turn out to be a bad idea.
Jan 16th, 2011
Gregg Z
As ever, Vendor of Quack Nostrums advances a series of cogent observations. (Here’s where the American chimes in on the topic of obsolete British currency, begging to be instructed to perform an act of auto-eroticism; a “journey of self discovery” which would be considered physically impossible). But..
would not the pre-1971 nomenclature for the sum in question be
“three and ten”, not “three pound ten”?
Of course, having been born in the States in December 1967 (“deep in injury time” in the life of the shilling), only one town over from Dean Friedman, I’m on admittedly shaky turf here. But then, I’ve watched more than my fair portion of Python and Benny Hill, so it about evens out.
Besides, what’s 20 quid to the bloody Midland Bank?
Jan 16th, 2011
Bobby String
Sorry Gregg, but “three and ten” would have been three shillings and ten pence, considerably less than three pound ten.
I can just about remember pounds, shillings and pence, having been born in England in 1962. Now living in South Africa (since 2008) I have Rands and cents to deal with – three currencies in a lifetime is enough I reckon. You’d feel at home here though because the Rand gets colloquialized to ‘bucks’.
Ô¿Ô
Jan 16th, 2011
Gregg Z
Correction noted, Stringy Bob. I should be sentenced to 15 minutes of mantra-filled oompah.
May the Lord have mercy on both of us..
Jan 17th, 2011
Charles Exford
I must admit I have given thought to the possibility of £3 10/- before.
But NB57, like myself, would have been seven and a half at the time of decimalisation. Assuming that the gang were all in the same school year (and whose gang wasn’t?) the one who had Scalextric was unlikely therefore to have been older than 8 and a half (ie about your sort of age, Bobby). It would have been a very privileged child who was entrusted with the fabled electronic racing toy at that age in 1970-71 I can tell you ….though of course this one’s uncle owned the shop so who knows …. but then again, at that age Crewe Alexandra seemed esoteric enough, never mind Dukla Prague.
In that generation on the Wirral I’d say it was to be a year or two after decimalisation when we were occasionally invited round to gangmates’ houses to glimpse the semi-functional racing tracks that their big brothers allowed them to use, now that the transformer was pretty much f*cked (I have still NEVER to this day operated a fully functional Scalextric and it is a source of nagging resentment. If the fixed odds coupon does bring early retirement I’ll defo be joining one of those clubs I heard about on the wireless and mentioned in the “media” thread on here recently).
If I had to guess I’d set the song in around 73-74, peak age for subbuteo playing for those of our age, and about the age when the exotic names of European football started to fascinate, and when £3.10, for example would still have bought your grandad at least 12 pints of Watney’s.
The real mysteries to many true pedants, of course, are (i) what the great game was doing in exile in the loft if the lad was so interested in it that he wanted to get hold of the Dukla Prague away??? (but there’s no accounting for zealous mothers I suppose), and (ii) I never realised they sold subbuteo in sports shops as well as toy shops. Good bit of marketing that, if so.
Jan 18th, 2011
Bobby String
@ EXXO
“I never realised they sold subbuteo in sports shops as well as toy shops. Good bit of marketing that, if so.”
I think it is possible that sports related games were sold in sports shops back then, though my memory does not permit me the luxury of being certain on that point. What has to be borne in mind is that back in those days sports shops were actually sports shops and not the loud, brash chains of overpriced boutiques that they are nowadays.
Our local sports shop was a small, almost corner shop type of operation, but you could buy anything sports related there and if he didn’t have it, he could get it for you. You could get anything from fishing rods to golf tees, swimming trunks to scrum caps – I bet you could even have got a pair of Picalilli shinpads had you put your mind to it! There was no loud music and racks of over-priced replica shirts or trainers that you had to take out a mortgage to buy, no spotty teenage assistants who knew nothing of sport but everything about the latest designer names to be seen in. In my local sports shop when I was a lad the top of the range footwear was Dunlop Green Flash tennis shoes at £4.99! OK, £4.99 was a lot of money for sports shoes in the early seventies.
I always imagined the kid’s uncle’s sports shop to be like the one I visited when I was a kid, dingy and dusty and run by an ex P.E. teacher or something, and therefore perfectly possible that he would be able to get you any Subbuteo kit you wanted – even Crewe Alexandra! Anybody out there remember seeing Subbuteo in a sports shop?
Ô¿Ô
Jan 18th, 2011
Bobby String
By the way, whilst trying to find out if Subbuteo was ever sold in sports shops, I came across the devastating news that in the 70′s and 80′s they never produced a Dukla Prague away kit, so that kid’s uncle must have sat up until the small hours of the morning painting the DP away colours over some other team!
Maybe the DP away kit mentioned in the song is actually a reference to a replica shirt that the kid wore to show off to the ‘mere mortal’ he was about to thrash at Subbuteo?
Ô¿Ô
Jan 18th, 2011
Mr Larrington
As a young Mr Larrington there was a Scalextric layout in my life from age four and a bit, which pre-dated decimalisation by about three years. Actually, it didn’t, but only because we lived in Germany at the time.
Jan 18th, 2011
Third Rate Les
I’ve been struggling to understand what you’re talking about here, and finally understood – you think the Dukla Prague Away kit was a Subbuteo accessory. That’s never occurred to me before.
It’s a real kit, from a sports shop. You wouldn’t buy Subbuteo in a sports shop.
Jan 18th, 2011
Bobby String
Sorry Les, I e-mailed a guy who runs a Subbuteo enthusiasts website and he informs me that Subbuteo was actually sold more in sports shops than in toy shops. Here’s a quote from his e-mail:
“Oddly, Subbuteo was MOSTLY sold in sports shops in the 1970s. I seem to recall an interview with one of Subbuteo’s sales managers in the Subbuteoworld club magazine where he said that they prefered sports shops to toy shops – I guess because the game was regarded as more of a hobby, and also for teenage boys. The target audience was more likely to be in a sports shop.”
and also…
“Only last week, my mate Dave was listing all the places he could buy Subbuteo in Brighton in the 1970s (he’s older than me), and it was something like three sports shops, and one toy shop.”
That said, the fact (which he also confirmed) that Subbuteo never produced a Dukla Prague away kit in the seventies, does lead to the more likely conclusion that the obnoxious kid was wearing a Dukla Prague away shirt, which is what I always assumed to be the meaning of that line. I think the line is more related to the kid thinking he was better than you, not only because he had Scalextric but also because he had the aforementioned footy shirt that no-one else had. I guess only NB57 knows the real answer…
Ô¿Ô
Jan 18th, 2011
Bobby String
Forgot to include this from his e-mail also:
The late 1960s Subbuteo catalogue has a picture of a large Subbuteo window display, and the signs above reads “Camping Sports”.
P.S. Here’s the Subbuteo site I got the information from – well worth a browse for any Subbuteo fans out there.
Ô¿Ô
Jan 18th, 2011
Vendor of Quack Nostrums
I’m sure that I read somewhere recently that Nigel said the Dukla Prague bit was fairly random, it could just as easily been Ujpest Dozsa.
I must have been a very good little boy during 1973 because Santa presented me with a Subbuteo ‘Continental Club Edition’ that Christmas.
Check here for details (note the current selling price!)
Now as wonderful as this set was I soon felt the need for all the accessories required for that big match atmosphere, so I spent every spare tanner and bob (sorry, we’d gone decimal by ’73 – every spare 2 1/2p and 5p) on supplementing the wonderful continental club edition. Over the next year, and in time for the 1974 world cup, I managed to get hold of;
C101: Floodlighting Pylon
C102: Two diving Goalkeepers.
C104: Photographers, trainer and manager.
C107: Referee and two linesmen.
C109 Two fully assembled deluxe goals.
C110: TV Tower.
C111: Half-Time Scoreboard.
C113: Ambulance and Policeman Set.
C115(Z): Match Score Recorder.
C121: Three match balls.
C123: Live Action Goalkeepers.
C124: Training Kit A. Target Board.
C128: The F.A. Cup.
C129: Number Transfers.
C130: World Cup Goals.
C131: Two “Corner Kick” figures.
C132: Two “Throw-in” figures.
C133: Six Interchangeable goalkeepers.
plus several teams so that it wasn’t always Everton v Man U.
The point of this pointless table football based nostalgia is that all this essential nonsense was indeed purchased in our village sports shop, which was uncannily similar to the one described above by Mr String, down to been run by an ex-PE teacher. I also purchased tennis rackets, cricket bats, football shirts, scarves (including ‘silk’ ones in team colours for wearing tied round the wrist, in a bizarre Bay City Roller parody) and all other sporting accessories.
I am fairly certain that said Uncle’s sports shop would have been of a similar ilk.
Jan 18th, 2011
Charles Exford
@ Bobby and Vendor – superlative stuff. Now I know.
@ Les. In all my Subbuteo years, we never dreamed of donning any sort of replica kit while playing. Not even when I led my imaginary team called Farndon Athletic to a European cup final in 1975 (the siteowner will be interested to note that it contained both Kevin Beattie and Trevor Whymark, but I digress). No, it’s definitely a piss-take of all the obscure Subbuteo team colours that us lads used to fantasise about getting (which is why it could easily have been Ujpest Dozsa or Hajduk Split). There was a list that came with every Subbuteo set of what seemed like hundreds of colours available, and you could get an updated list from your local toy (and, finally today I discover, sports) shop. I used to drool over the vast range at Beatties (toy department of big store) in Birkenhead. Many of them served as 2 or 3 or more teams. I’ve got a box in front of me now, purchased maybe 5 years ago at a car boot sale, that says “Hartlepool or Werder Bremen” – alas, the colours I bought it in are neither. At one point in the 70s I had a Motherwell home which could easily have passed for Dukla away, but as Bobby says, their list never contained many sides in Eastern Europe.
Les’ idea of being able to buy an actual Eastern European replica kit to wear, of any description, from any UK sports shop in the mid 70s is beyond even the surrealism of Blackwell. And that some of us do indeed wear such shirts at gigs these days to celebrate a silly musical mention of a Subbuteo team kit is surely therefore even more wonderful. Or should I say “wunderbar”! “Magnifico”! “Calcio di miniatura!”
Jan 18th, 2011
Chris The Siteowner
Oh the Continental Club Edition brings back memories. Must have had mine in about the 1971-72 season, I reckon, although I remember a friend getting really proud of his Scotland team in time for the ’74 World Cup. Then it all went up in the loft, never to be seen again until I moved into a a Men Behaving Badly (sans any Knobhead) setup in 1988 and we splashed out on a Subbuteo set before even a kettle. And painted the Ipswich and Portsmouth players with the right colour skin, hair, etc. Realistic lower division match atmosphere? You bet. Anyway, the point of all this is to wonder how it had never even occurred to me that NB57 could have been talking about a shirt, not a Subbuteo team. I’m glad Exxo’s put that one to bed so firmly.
I love all the stuff here.
Jan 19th, 2011
Third Rate Les
OK – I stand corrected. I still find it slightly odd that he says “Dukla Prague away kit” rather than “team” or something – it seems an odd choice of words. Still, as he pointed out to me when I met him (did I mention that?!) the irony is that the home kit is much better. Trouble is, as a home kit it doesn’t scan so well as a nice troachaic heptameter (my words, not his).
Maybe my problem here is that having only really got to know the song in the last 5 years, replica kits are obviously much more common than in the 70s. Actually, back then I only knew one person who had a replica shirt even of our local team (Blackburn Rovers), let alone anything foreign, so you are all clearly right.
My other problem is that I never really got Subbuteo at all. I never really understood the game and it always seemed so expensive to buy enough of it to get that big match atmosphere, and just flicking the players at the ball just didn’t seem to work. I was more of a train set man as I found it much easier to make the scenery from plaster of paris.
Jan 19th, 2011
Bobby String
I have to agree with you Les, about the ‘kit’ thing. And even if we were to assume it was a replica shirt, the word ‘kit’ in terms of football always meant the whole outfit including shorts and socks rather than just the shirt, to me anyway. And yes, you’re right about the lack of replica shirts back then. I, for my sins, had a Man united shirt around 1976 or 77ish until the local sports shop got my local team’s new kit (Alloa Athletic, Scottish second division team) which I proudly wore when playing footy in games periods at school. Never wore it for anything else though, certainly not Subbuteo or Scalextric. As for away kits and foreign teams, forget it, they just weren’t available. So, I think we must all agree that despite the perhaps inappropriate use of the word ‘kit’, it is a Subbuteo team we’re talking about and not a shirt. Being a birdwatching anorak these days, I’d far rather see the bird it was named after than play the game!
Ô¿Ô
Jan 19th, 2011
Third Rate Les
Quite right about the “kit” being the whole thing – otherwise it’s a top.
hmmm – come to think of it, I went to a school (briefly) in 1977/78 where lots of people had their team shirt, as I ended up making myself one and my mum sewing on the stripes on the sleeve. She also sewed on a Stoke City badge, for reasons known only to her. They were mostly Blackpool fans around there, so we had 20-a-side games of red/oranges (i.e. Liverpool, Man U, Wales and Blackpool) vs the rest of us (Man City, Celtic, England, maybe Preston). So I’m wrong again about the lack of shirts.
Funny how the mind works, innit? I
Jan 19th, 2011
Paul F
I definitely remember Subutteo accessories in Jack Sharp’s in Whitechapel in the late 70s.
Jan 19th, 2011
Vendor of Quack Nostrums
Subbutteo was a good hobby for a boy to have.
But if you’ve just got that joke then I think you are really sad.
Jan 19th, 2011
Paul F
Or even Subbuteo.
Jan 19th, 2011
Paul F
Sorry Vendor – I was sniping at my own misspelling rather than yours – you just got caught in the cross-fire.
(And yes – I get the joke. And yes – I am really sad.)
Jan 19th, 2011
Vendor of Quack Nostrums
@ Paul F
No worries. If I was caught in the cross-fire then I deserved it for assuming I’d spelt it correctly and ignoring the wiggly red line on the grounds that the spell checker obviously knows very little Latin or table top sports games. (see also Escalado)
Which all gets me thinking. Subbuteo was marketed as ‘table soccer’. I’ve never played it on a table in my life. We didn’t have a table big enough. It was always on the floor, on hands and knees. Hence the need to constantly reach for the bostik.
Jan 19th, 2011
Bobby String
Good point, Vendor, I don’t ever recall any of the relatively few games of Subbuteo I played being on a table. Maybe the inventor, Peter Adolph, had a huge table and just assumed everybody else had similarly sized dining room furniture?
Ô¿Ô
P.S. Spelchekkerz are overated anyway!
Jan 20th, 2011
Paul F
Very good point. We always played on my bedroom floor (which, due to limited clearance, meant players were always in danger of being snapped by a misplaced hand).
Did anybody else find that broken players whose legs had been glued became tricky wingers if their body was now leaning slightly forward? No? Just me?
I did know one person who set it it up on a large dining table though.
(And Vendor – the fault is mine. It’s hard to catch somebody in the cross-fire when shooting at yourself, but I managed it.)
Jan 20th, 2011
Paul F
Oh – and Bobby String, that Peter Upton site should come with a health warning. I lost practically an entire day’s productive work when I first discovered that.
Jan 20th, 2011
Mr Larrington
@Bobby String: in much the same way that vendors of sofas assume that everyone’s living room is only slightly smaller than Blenheim Palace. And the IKEA catalogue routinely portrays a typical bathroom to be the same size as that building in Seattle where Boeing assembles 747s.
Bah!
Jan 20th, 2011
Chris The Siteowner
Funny that: I assumed that as happened with me (and all my mates), when the Subbuteo set arrived, doting Dads were sent out to buy a huge sheet of chipboard to which the pitch could be pinned or even permanently glued. It took two to lift the board onto the dining room table, but that’s exactly where the games were played. Can’t imagine playing it on carpet!
Jan 20th, 2011
Bobby String
Our lounge is so small if we played Subbuteo it would have to five-a-side!
On the subject of table top footie games, although I never had Subbuteo (did have Scalextric though) I remember two other footie games from the early 70′s. I had one made by a company called Casdon which consisted of a plastic pitch with built in players that were rotated by means of little knobs at either end of the pitch. Their bases had a little plastic lug that flicked the ball when you turned the knobs.
Then there was the poor man’s Subbuteo which was a game with a fold-up cardboard pitch and players with flat bases and a tiddlywink instead of a ball, which was flicked by pressing down the players’ bases on it. One of the rules was “No offsides” and there was one kid who thought that offside meant when the ball went off the side of the ptich! Ah, those were the days…
Ô¿Ô
Jan 20th, 2011
Bobby String
For those interested, here’s another site with a comprehensive list of football board games, card games etc. Paul F – you have been warned!!!
The Beautiful Games
And the tiddlywinks type game I mentioned is Waddington’s Table Football …just in case anybody thought it was such a bizarre idea I must have made it up!
Ô¿Ô
Jan 20th, 2011
Mr Larrington
In my capacity as a sad git, I recall a bizarre table-top footie game in which the players stood in circular depressions on the playing surface and were mounted on springs. When the ball came to rest at your player’s “feet” you pulled him backwards and let him go. If this was not done with respect the ball would, yes indeedy, be fired clean out of the game and under the sofa.
Jan 21st, 2011
Paul F
Chris – my Dad suggested doing that, but wouldn’t buy a piece of chipboard. He tried to fob me off with a slightly too small piece he already had which would have meant losing a small portion of the pitch (and made the 6 yard boxes equivalent to one yard boxes). Needless to say I told him I’d rather just smooth it out on the carpet than have the pitch dimensions changed.
Jan 21st, 2011
John Anderson
I can still recall John Anderson Senior (RIP) being hauled off to the timber yard to buy a large piece of chipboard onto which my pitch was proudly mounted.
Anderson 2 then invited a friend round while I was out and they broke nearly all the players. Chiz.
Jan 21st, 2011
TWO FAT FEET
This may dissuade anybody from wearing the away shirt to a gig ever again, but my wife has just pointed out the similarity between the badge and Mickey Mouse.
Apr 8th, 2011
Steve Playford
What is the relevance of the dodgy blue mass mentioned just before the price of the transformer?
May 15th, 2011
Martin
The old Scalextric transformers were a lump of blue plastic, about five inches high and a little less across. They may still be so, I dunno?
May 16th, 2011
Martin
Aha. This is a Scalextric transformer as I remember them.
May 16th, 2011
Bobby String
That certainly is a ‘blue mass’ Martin. Even if it couldn’t power your Scalextric it could easily stun an ox, I’ll stake my wig!
(Sorry, had a sudden attack of archaic English there).
Ô¿Ô
May 16th, 2011
Martin
It weighed about the same as an ox too. While we’re wig-staking I’ll stake mine that no doting mother would keep the Scalextric in the loft due to not having arms strong enough to hold the thing whilst coming down the stepladder. A right beastly bit of kit, and no mistake.
Thanks (presumably) Chris for tidying my link up
May 16th, 2011
Chris the Siteowner
Newsflash: In an unlikely resurrection, Dukla Prague have clinched promotion to the top division of Czech football.
The original Dukla Praha were “rescued” in the 90s and moved out of the capital. They are now known as FK Marila Příbram, an anagram of “Milton Keynes Dons” (are you sure? – Ed) and have just avoided relegation from the top division this season.
A local Prague team changed its name to resurrect “FK Dukla Praha” five years ago, and promptly took over a second division team, which AFC Wimbledon/FC United supporters might consider cheating a bit. However, they’ve now made it to the top flight, and the Champions League surely beckons. Obligatory shot of champagne being sprayed around the dressing room here.
May 23rd, 2011
Charles Exford
One of the most ephemeral comments on this site ever, and ignore if it’s after 6.55pm today when you read this, but Dukla’s first game back in the top flight after 17 years is right now, and here’s a link to a stream. The away kit has become the home kit permanently now it seems.
Jul 29th, 2011
Mrs Gibson's Husband
It is “dodgy Blue Mask” isn’t it. Like the Lou Reed album!?
Oct 26th, 2011
louis vuitton
It’s onerous to search out knowledgeable folks on this matter, but you sound like you recognize what you’re talking about! Thanks ?t? 2028
Nov 19th, 2011
Paul F
I’ve just drifted back to this page to share with you my news that on chasing an order for a DPAK from Toffs, I was told that it was in the process of being made for me (which gives a cheap thrill all of its own).
In doing so I decided to explore the website highlighted by Bobby String a year ago to the very day, and managed to find a game I’d almost entirely forgotten. Did anybody else have the Busby-approved Top Team Soccer? You started with a Monopoly style board, going round buying up players and building a W-M formation team. You then played the match with dice on a a grid marked out as a pitch, with the relevant players being allocated the appropriate sections of the pitch. Frankly – it was a bit dull, and confined to the wardrobe once Striker arrived.
Jan 20th, 2012
Vendor of Quack Nostrums
@Paul F: And looking at the Buy Now price of £75.00 it might be worth checking if it is still at the back of the wardrobe. Frankly dull football games were all the rage in the 60s. Bought as presents by out of touch Aunts and Uncles who worked on the premise ‘He loves football, he’s going to froth with excitement if we buy him…….. (inset name of yet another long gone monopoly style, overly complex, impenetrable, unrealistic, top player-approved meld of plastic, card and paper).’
I was the proud owner of Wembley, a game designed specifically to suck all the joy and spontaneity out of the FA Cup. It didn’t actually bother to include any element that remotely replicated actual football, the games themselves being decided purely on the throw of a dice. As I recall you had to plough your way, round by round, through the entire FA Cup fixture list. You needed to start in early September just to get in a May final. No skill involved at all; the ties being decided by cunningly numbered dice biased according to league position. So a top flight team had a dice numbered, say, 6,5,4,4,3,1 played a non-league team who used a dice numbered, say 2,1,1,0,0,0. Upsets were rare.
The game is long gone (pity – Buy Now £65.00), but the the memory lingers on in the form of one dice, which resides in my drawer, a reminder of childhood. Absolutely useless however unless you need to throw either a 5, a 3 or a 0.
Jan 20th, 2012
Paul F
Spot on Vendor. I do believe it was one of those Aunts who wasn’t actually related that bought me this for the very reason you suggest. And given that it was released in 1969, it was probably a bargain bucket purchase when I got it in (I presume) the mid-late 70s. The W-M formation was certainly new to me.
As for “designed specifically to suck all the joy and spontaneity out of the FA Cup”, isn’t that a definition of Adrian Chiles?
Wembley would have been right up my street as a nerdy kid, I suspect.
Jan 20th, 2012
John Burscough
Nothing like the Lux Familiar Cup, then.
Jan 20th, 2012
mate of the bloke
Bobby String wrote: ”
And the tiddlywinks type game I mentioned is Waddington’s Table Football …just in case anybody thought it was such a bizarre idea I must have made it up!”
I had that game Bobby. Used to put the cardboard pitch on the carpet, but it then had an uneven ridge in it. And with a deft flick of the counter (ball) i could hit the tv or the settee, but rarely the goal.
Jan 22nd, 2012
Dave Wiggins
Waddington’s Table Soccer. ‘Bobby String’ and ‘Mate of the Bloke’, you have just given me a frisson of excitement and warm nostalgia. That game was my best-friend between about 1975-1980 inclusive.
Jan 24th, 2012
SPENCER THE HALFWIT
A dozen or so Finns, hoping to compete for some kind of championship.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtwkRd6zHwg
Jan 26th, 2012
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