Small Players and Big Balls

The title itself is enough to put you off your dinner, I apologise for that but it had to be said. When I opened my first box set on Christmas morning 1969 I was confronted with that statement in all it’s glory. The poor guys in their pristine(??) red and blue kits with big brown balls that came up to their chest. The game was advertised as the replica of Association Football, and included the immortal phrase of “Reproducing all the thrills of real football by FINGER TIP CONTROL”, printed on the box.

So when was the last time any of us saw the “Real” game played with balls this size which if to scale would have been around 1.5m in diameter, I suppose it would make goalkeeping easier, and the amount of 0-0 scorelines would become the rule rather than any kind of exception.

But as we know it wasn’t the scale of things that fascinated us back then, it was the fact that we were in control, we scored the goals, we saved the shots, and we won the trophies, no one cared the ball was so big as long as our dreams were fulfilled.

 

 

Why So Big?

I’m no expert but when you consider the original game of button shaped bases, and flat cardboard (later celluloid) players, which were taller than their plastic 3D counterparts, the bigger ball looked less out of place, but it also suited the flats and was the ball used in competitions when I joined a Club.

Most of the “Old Timers” used the flats, and these monster 25mm (1”) balls, which us youngsters with our heavyweights found a little cumbersome. Admittedly it was a decent target to aim at, and allowed flats and the new fangled heavyweight figures to compete on the same pitch. The flats players usually were more successful, probably down to the fact that most of the players who used heavyweights were younger and definitely less experienced.

A smaller ball of 18mm (3/4”), was also available at that time, touted as for the more experienced player, and boy were they light, around a 1/3 of the weight of the beach ball we normally used. To be perfectly honest the only time I ever played with this type of ball was if any of my mates had one, and they in my opinion didn’t suit our heavyweights but it did have the effect of teaching you how to touch a ball and keep it under control. It did little to teach us heretics with the heavyweights anything else

Why these balls were never used in competition I have no idea, being young and foolish at the time I never asked, or if the truth be known even cared. If anyone knows please let us know.

Striking A Happy Medium

The modern size of 22mm (7/8”) is not as modern as you think. These were available when I was young and were sold as an accessory entitled “New” Continental Ball (C121). The name to me implies these were the balls intended to be used with the new Continental aka heavyweight range of players. These balls were of course like many other youngsters in the late 60’s and early 70’s the first accessory I purchased.

The balls themselves were maybe a tad heavier than their bigger counterpart, being smaller and around the same weight as “Big Brother” suited the Heavyweights better, you could definitely put your laces through it, and with a little practice learn to control, pass, chip and shoot far better than the bigger variety.

The confusing thing was why did box sets still contain “Big Bertha” when these beauties were available. Obviously SSG must have had far more big guns in stock than they cared to admit.

The original medium sized ball had stick on decals which from a distance looked a reasonable replica, but they did nothing to enhance it’s rolling ability, removal of the decals and a bit of a clean up to remove any sticky residue actually produced a ball that was half decent.

The “Old Timers” still persisted with the bigger ball, their flats weren’t fans of this new, heavier compared to it’s size, samller ball. Whip one of these out at the Club, you’d be branded a heretic, and dragged kicking and screaming to be tortured in a darkened room. Tied to a chair with a spotlight trained on your face listening to the immortal words “We have ways of making you flick”, (and if they had a whiff of lavender polish from your players you would probably have been exorcised in the process).

However throughout the 70’s the 22mm started to become the norm in outside Tournaments that were organised by SSG, from memory and experience ETSA Tournaments used “Big Bertha” due to many of the players using the flats. SSG Tournaments however were predominately heavyweight players and the Continental 22mm slowly became the accepted ball of choice. By 1982 they were the official ball, according to the “Official” FISA Rules.

Back To The 70’s

The Village Club back then used to buy balls in bulk, and they were checked and graded on arrival. Now if that conjures up a picture of an 18 wheeler turning up and dumping a mountain of plastic balls on the doorstep I hate to disappoint.

We had 3 boxes labelled Match, Training, and I kid you not Questionable. The hierarchy of the club literally flicked them around and put them in an appropriate box. Match balls were ones that at least had some semblance of actually being spherical and rolled around as such. Training balls were those items that were not quite in that category but were at least usable. That left the Questionable box which by far always seemed to hold the greatest number of balls, they exhibited traits of lawn bowls, some you would even say were radio controlled by your opponent, and some were more akin to a rugby ball, such was the quality control at that time.

Not one to miss a trick, My Uncle Bill who was Secretary used to sell off the contents of the Questionable box to unsuspecting customers in the area, to be fair to my Uncle he did advertise them as seconds. In my opinion even seconds was pushing it somewhat, but the money raised did allow us to buy more balls and fill the Questionable box again, decent work if you can get it

I only have two of those original balls in my current small collection, and one is definitely Questionable. It defies logic, I’ve actually taken a throw in with this gem and it went out of play along the same touchline. Probably due to the fact that a previous owner had vandalised it with a tube of superglue. The other is in fact rather decent, I tend not to give it much playing time however due to having metal goals, it wouldn’t be long before it was reduced to it’s component parts, such is the accuracy of my shooting.

Bouncy Balls

Some time during the early 80’s some oik in the Subbuteo Design Department came up with a sponge ball. A friend of mine brought some, I was no longer playing regular at that time but my mate Warren still dabbled. He invited me round one evening for a game, produced these and we tried them out. These balls were lets say beyond Questionable and had they been around in the 70’s would have had a box all to themselves and labelled “Futile” and to make matters worse they were yellow and looked like a sponge. The guy who came up with this masterpiece of technology needs naming and shaming. However trying to get someone to own up to this over engineered globe after all this time would be nigh on impossible, so we’ll leave it there.

Modern Balls

I think we all know this story, so I won’t dwell too long. The modern ball we all love and know can probably be traced back to the efforts of Trevor Spencer at Waddingtons. Sonic Welding technology, and actually printing the design on the ball was a revelation, it was only recently that I managed to get hold of one of those orange Tango balls I’d actually stopped playing before these gems were produced, and you’d never tell that design and construction of this ball is around 40 years old, it’s round, rolls nicely, looks great and no different from balls that are manufactured today, better in some respects.

In the intervening years between the production of that first Tango ball and today, I’ve played a fair few games now and again but never with an original Tango. So thanks to Mr Spencer we have a ball that would always be placed inside the “Match” ball box, and perhaps would have saved my Uncle from thinking about ways of disposing of his surplus ever growing “Questionable” ball mountain

Keep On Flicking

Ian