Last year the long running partnership between EA Sports and FIFA came to an end when EA Sports FC was launched on gaming consoles such as PlayStation and Xbox. The relationship between the two could be traced back to 1993 with the launch of FIFA International Soccer and the annual iterations of the very successful game that followed.
Another relationship between a football authority and enterprise also ended recently. That of UEFA and Panini. Since 1970, the Italian company has produced stickers for the FIFA World Cup. While this relationship may be intact, UEFA’s agreement recently came to an end.
My earliest memory of collecting stickers for a tournament was at Euro ’88. The Republic of Ireland had qualified and for the first time, Irish players were part of the album. For the following tournaments, Panini’s monopoly continued with World Cups and European Championships. Today it is younger members of my household that have revived stickers in my life and albums have returned. The first was in 2018, then 2020(1) and most recently at Qatar in 2022. All were Panini.
The 2024 competition is the first in my lifetime that Panini are not involved. Instead Topps have replaced Panini. There are several noticeable different in the album and approach of the new brand.
The first is that the album itself was free. I am not sure if this is the general approach – it makes sense – but it is a first for me.
The second is the size of the booklet. The last six tournaments have had between 540 and 682 stickers: 2010 FIFA World Cup - 640; UEFA Euro 2012: 540; 2014 FIFA World Cup - 640; UEFA Euro 2016 - 680; 2018 FIFA World Cup -682; UEFA Euro 2020 - 678.
From scanning the album for 2024 I believe there are over 800 stickers! That’s a lot more money to spend if you want to fill the book. Maybe this is why the stickers are not labelled 1-814 but instead get numbered via a country or letter code first. It’s an odd approach and difficult to follow.
The third is the inclusion of teams that haven’t made the Finals! This is a first for me. It is probably due to the very late point at which teams now qualify – March 2024 – and is not the publisher’s fault as the album needs to be designed and prepared for distribution. But the 9 teams that failed to qualify for the tournament via the playoffs all appear in the album (albeit in smaller sticker form). You will see Wales, Greece, Finland and more in the book. You won’t see them next month in Germany.
Another downside of this is that teams that have qualified via the playoffs also appear as smaller stickers, and somewhat diminish these qualifying countries.
Fourth, some teams are unlicensed as Panini still holds the rights for countries such as England, Germany, Italy and Spain. This means that some top players are not included in the album. Maybe this is why player names are not listed under where the sticker will go.
So, interest has quickly waned in this house. The book seems unachievable and is not terribly interesting. This compares to Qatar 2022 when nearly 80% of the Panini album was filled here. The arrival of “competition” has done little to improve the product. One monopoly has been traded for another. I believe the original one was better.