Footy emblem cards the greatest prize of all
Occasionally you’d come across somebody who knew someone else, whose older brother had almost collected an entire set of these distracting pieces of memorabilia.
Mostly though it was left to us mere mortals to try to collect as many as possible before either the footy season ended, or your school banned them because they were, as said, proving too distracting.
Not sure how popular they are with kids today, but the banning of footy cards at schools actually happened. Imagine having that problem as a sporting code; trading cards featuring your game are that distracting that they are taken off kids. Amazing.
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| Rugby league club emblem cards from the late 1980s. |
The cards featured in the image in this article were what used to be called emblem cards. They'd feature the names of the players included in that year's set on the back and/or vital club stats like premierships and ratings on how arrogant its players were (ha ha ha).
As good as the Winfield Cup's players were on the field, there were more highly sought-after cards being chased via side trades and games of flick (seeing who could flick their card closest to a wall) and these emblem cards were the main prize. Mostly, the card flick games were best of three, to give contestants a sporting chance.
Whether it was an intentional tactic or just the way things panned out, it seemed the most popular players of the day were the easiest cards to get your hands on.
The most difficult cards always seemed to be those of little-known Western Suburbs Magpies or Illawarra Steelers players.
We have absolutely no data or evidence to back this claim up, so feel free to weigh in and set the record straight on Twitter, if you enthusiasm takes you there.
No article about footy cards would be complete, of course, without a mention of the bubble/chewing gum which came with these cards. Oh boy. It was so so bad ... but so so good.
