Thread: Anyone remember the Panini footy sticker albums?

I remember completing these badboys:

Bonus point for the United player on the right of '88

Indeed, we used to play 'Wembley' down the park - our local version of it was just the one 'keeper and 2 or more teams (the 'teams' could consist of just one player) scoring the best out of 3 who were then into the next round.

I know that 'Wembley' could also be played by simply hitting a ball against a wall and taking it in turns to hit it; if you missed or didn't hit the wall, you were out. Some extra rules were added like the ball was only allowed to bounce once or had to be hit over a certain height, etc. This version we knew as 'Slam'.

My point being, when we used to play our version of Wembley, the keeper used to start the game again by having his back to the players and throwing the ball high into the air and shouting "PANINI!" which meant that 2 players had to jump to head the ball and gurn like Mike Newell & Andy Gray on the '87 Panini cover

Stirred any memories?

*EDIT - It's not Mike Newell on the '87 cover, he didn't sign for the Toffees until 1989. Thrash my man, is it Mike Higgins???

Used to collect them when at school (early 80s) - I even knew all the players names!!

I do remember 'badges' (shiney ones) were worth 2 normal ones & the first few at the front of the book usually worth 4 or 5 normal stickers (as they were 'rare' ).

Also had non footy sticker books as well:

Flash Gordon
Pete's Dragon
Star Wars

I had Euro 2004 & Germany 06 footy albums too.

I found it very amusing in the local shop with the kids buying one pack at a time and I used to buy 50

I think my dad enjoyed collecting the stickers more than I did.

I wish u hadn't started this thread.

I was going to post show the '78 WC book which i remember being my first - but the book i had included the England squad, even though we didn't qualify - but the Panini one that i've found doesn't seem to. So there's a chance i had some imposter book going on. Either that or they done an English edition that included our squad for sales and i just can't find reference to it.

I also remember spending hours on end with mates saying those 2 immortal swap pile words: "Got, got, got, want, want, got, got, want....."

Maybe they did two editions, the earlier obviously when Panini thought that England were a dead cert to qualify?

You may have a rarity on your hands there, bruv

*EDIT - you're talking in the past tense so I'm presuming you got rid of your copy?

The United player is Colin Gibson, decent left back

I still have all mine at my parents house, all completed (had to cheat a little)

My boy did the world cup one this year and kin hell, it was expensive!

the last year i bought them stickers and the book was 87..... cheers for the memory swipz....


the memory of only bein able to afford a few packs a week, where most people at skool were gettin 5 packs a day...... fagen would have been proud of me though

i was only ever bothered about collecting the west ham pages though

Originally Posted by swipezster

Maybe they did two editions, the earlier obviously when Panini thought that England were a dead cert to qualify?

You may have a rarity on your hands there, bruv

*EDIT - you're talking in the past tense so I'm presuming you got rid of your copy?

Long time ago mate. I'm guessing it disappeared when we moved in '82. Never thought about keeping stuff like that - we live, we learn...

I still have my Panini '87, the last ever England game at Wembley (where Germany beat us 0-1 in October 2000) match programme and my proudest football memorabilia:

The France '98 mascot on a keyring complete with France '98 mascot telephone card, plus the ticket from the Brazil vs Morocco match I attended inside the programme which was in French and English

Think smilodon was with us Remember the scousers invading our tent on the night and asking if we'd seen Mark and Big Spanna replied, "No we ain't seen Barry either, now Fuck off!"?

Originally Posted by Curly

I still have all mine at my parents house, all completed

Same me Curly.There was no way in the world i was ever gonna throw them away.I also have the World Cups 86 & 90 too.

yeah i remember those.
still got a few of them knocking about in storage somewhere - Football 87, Football 89, Mexico 86 ... back from a time when i actually gave a shite about football

had Gremlins, Return Of The Jedi & Marvel 'Secret Wars' ones aswell.

most of them almost complete... but always not quite

I used to collect them too - in the 80s

As long as i got all the Liverpool players i was happy - used to love swapping with my mates
If i remember rightly didn't Panini do the sticker books for cricket too?

My kids are into Match Attaks - not quite the same as Panini