Bye Bye Cisse :(

He's retired from Football this week :(

Here is Cisse's 2001/02 French Base Set Foil card with Auxerre.  It is a good card except the tackle rating of 5 hurts his playability.  However, the card below turns Djibril into a superstar.

This card just evolved into Djibril Charizard.  And Wizards finally spelled his name right. 

Thanks for the memories Cisse, I'll do my best to recreate them in Football Champions land.

Does such a person exist?

I've been trying to collect Football Champions since around 2007. I played the game in a hotel in Upstate New York against 3 total strangers whom I had just met for the first time in my life. Might Ipswich Town v Spurs. I of course was Ipswich and won on a headed goal by Mark Venus. From that point on I needed some of these cards.

That is where the downfall began. I started to collect these cards. It is now six years after this expensive decision was made and I still feel no closer than I did in 2007. I find out about cards I didn't know existed every few months. But that just makes the chase even greater.

My goal like any collector was to have all of the cards ever printed and to acquire them as soon as possible. I don't know why I have this tendency to get everything as fast as possible. Naturally I blame my american upbringing for that.

I then wondered if anyone out there has every Football Champions card ever made. I've seen some people have impressive cards but I really wonder if anyone has achieved the feat of owning every card. So if you come across this place and do, post a comment.

Update

This blog isn't dead. I haven't had time to check out anymore Football Champions items. Nothing new has been up on any of the Ebay websites (UK, Italy, France).

I was able to find out that card-game club would be willing to ship items to the United States, however in very limited quantities. Reason being the shop owner doesn't want to pay shipping. I don't think I really understand what they meant, usually the one buying the items pays shipping costs.

Also, there has been two people to contact me about trading...so if you are looking for cards, put up a comment on here or send me an email.

Football Champions Complete Spoiler

This is for the 2001-2002 seasons. All countries are included. All work is done by user J.L Robert (Football Champions expert). Go here to download the file:

Click.

A couple of notes about the spreadsheet:

ITBS- Italian Base Set

ITCM- Italian Calciomercato

ENBS- English Base Set

ENTR- English Title Race

FRBS- French Base Set

FRPT- French Pour Le Titre

The point breakdown is the most interesting topic, I believe. I hope to ask J.L. how he figured out the points as I'm very impressed by his work.

Introductions...

Football Champions is a card game I found after spending numerous years (and cash) playing MLB Showdown. During my time playing MLB Showdown, I was fortunate to meet many people throughout the country and talked to many of them on a regular basis (sup chat). One of the chatters talked about a soccer card game that essentially was MLB Showdown. I was able to pick up a starter and a few packs off UK Ebay. I was hooked.

The game itself was produced by Wizards of the Coast. It started with the 2001-2002 soccer (read: Football) season. The English Premier League, Ligue 1 (French), and Serie A (Italy) were all represented, first with a large base set, then a smaller expansion set later in the season.

After the first season, the French cards were ceased in production. The English sets were produced one more year (2002-2003). However, instead of being called Football Champions, the game was renamed under the Subbuteo moniker. This caused confusion amongst the people who played the game in the first year and was discontinued.

The most successful (or franchise to make it past one single season) was the Italian version. The final season for the Italian game was in 2004-2005.