giovedì 14 marzo 2024

Panini Calciatori 1997-98

 

Calciatori 1997-98 is the official sticker collection of the Italian football, covering all the professional leagues from Serie A to Serie C2. This is the first album with Ronaldo, who moved from Barcelona to FC Inter in the summer 1997. In addition, this collection is full of football stars playing in Serie A, like Zidane, Del Piero, Baggio, Pirlo, Djorkaeff, Batistuta, Veron, Mancini, Totti, Buffon, Cannavaro, Maldini, with special stickers dedicated to Vieri and Zola, playing abroad at that time. 

The album starts with the Serie A clubs in alphabetical order. For each club there are 21 stickers: the shiny club badge, the team photo (two stickers), and 18 player portrait stickers, with the careers printed on the album. After the Serie A clubs, there is the only additional section of this album, featuring 40 stickers of player caricatures made by the artist Achille Superbi. Here we can admire the comic version of the best Serie A players. 

The album continues with the Serie B section, including 9 stickers for each club: the shiny badge, the team photo, and 7 stickers with two players per sticker (for a total of 14 players). The album features then the Serie C1, with the club badge (half sticker) and the team photo stickers of the 36 clubs divided in two groups, and the Serie C2, with just the club badge sticker of the 54 clubs divided in three groups (one sticker includes four club badges). There are no updates for this collection.

In the season 1997/98, Juventus won the Serie A with controversial episodes, especially a not given penalty to Ronaldo during Juventus-Inter. However, the destiny in the European cups has been different: Juventus lost the Champions League final against Real Madrid (0-1), whereas Inter won the UEFA Cup (3-0).
































Back cover of the album

The fantastic Roberto Baggio: regular and caricature stickers

Young Italian talents that won the World Cup eight years later: Andrea Pirlo and Francesco Totti

Top stars in the Italian Serie A 1997/98: Ronaldo and Zidane

Future football managers: Roberto Mancini and Max Allegri

Two young talents rising in AC Parma: Gigi Buffon and Fabio Cannavaro

Oliver Bierhoff, the top scorer of the Serie A 1997/98 with 27 goals, and George Weah, striker of AC Milan

The caricature stickers of Vieri and Zola with the uniform of Italy, as they played abroad in 1997/98

Album details:
Full name: Calciatori 1997-98
Publisher: Panini
League: Italian (Serie A, Serie B, Serie C1, Serie C2)
Season: 1997/1998
Number of clubs and stickers per club:
  • Serie A (18 clubs, 21 stickers)
  • Serie B (20 clubs, 9 stickers)
  • Serie C1 (36 clubs, 1.5 stickers)
  • Serie C2 (54 clubs, 0.5 stickers)
Other sections:
  • Achille Superbi li vede così - Caricatures (40 stickers)
Update: No
Checklist: click here

Total number of stickers: 679







giovedì 7 marzo 2024

Topps Champions League 2022/2023

 

The official sticker collection of the UEFA Champions League for the season 2022/23 was released by Topps in September 2022. The collection features 31 of the 32 clubs in the competition, being Napoli excluded for rights issues. In addition to the regular album, that can be completed with the stickers from packets and the update set, there is also a LIVE album (described below) with stickers from the Champions League 2022/2023, released during the season. For the first time for this series, Topps introduced parallel stickers (with different colours and rarity) of two players per team (for a complete list, see the checklist in the album details below).

The albums starts with the contents and the first three stickers: the logo, the trophy, and the official matchballs. The album continues with a retrospective on the previous Champions League, with the UCL Team of the season (12 shiny stickers of the best players 2021/2022) and 11 stickers of the standout performers in the women's Champions League 2021/2022. 

The 26 teams (except Napoli) that directly qualified to the group stage are then shown in alphabetical order. For each club there are 18 stickers, out of which 16 player portrait stickers, the Next Gen sticker with the young promising player of the team, and the shiny Double Impact sticker with a combo of two key players. Regrettably there are no club badge stickers in this edition.

The team section is closed by Tottenham and followed by several special sections. "The global game" explores the different nationalities of the players with 18 stickers of players in action. Among them the Iranian Taremi (Porto), the Japanese Furuhashi (Celtic) and the Canadian Davies (Bayern Munchen). "Best of the Best" is dedicated to the records of the season 2021/22, with eight metallic stickers from the most clean sheets (Alisson) to the top assist maker (Sané). The Champions League overall records are also included with the "All-time records" section (16 stickers), featuring among the others Inzaghi, Maldini, Ancelotti. The album has a double page called "Dream Team" in which is possible to stick spare stickers with the favourite players. The "Legends" section features this year 12 shiny stickers with 11 players (Schmeichel, van Bronckhorst, Baresi, Maldini, Roberto Carlos, Xavi, Iniesta, Gerrard, Del Piero, Inzaghi, Drogba) and the coach Carlo Ancelotti. In this collection, there is space also for the women's Champions League with six stickers of the "Top Superstars" and the Youth League (1 sticker).

Due to the early release of this collection, the teams qualified through the play-offs were not known during the production of the album. In addition, the teams were not updated with the late transfers of the summer 2022. For this reason, there is a large update set of 116 stickers, to complete the album form numkber 545 to 660. In the update set there are the six teams qualified through the player-offs (16 player stickers per team) and 20 stickers with the new signings, featuring Onana, Kessié, Raphina, Aubameyang. In the following we show the empty album with the complete set of loose stickers and the updates to complete the album.




























The UEFA Youth League section with one sticker

Back cover of the album

The update set with 116 stickers for the album (from nr. 545 to 660) 


For the second time, the champions league sticker collection includes also LIVE stickers, featuring the best moments of the tournament. The previous season the LIVE section was part of the album, whereas for the 2023 edition, there is a separate album of 104 stickers. The album was included in the starterpack, wereas the LIVE stickers were released in 5 batches and they could be ordered from the Topps website.

The album is structured to follow the development of the competition. First, the group stage is shown (24 stickers), followed by the round of 16 (16 stickers), the quarter finals (16 stickers), the semifinals (12 stickers) and the final (12 stickers). In addition there are 24 stickers with the new signings from the winter transfer market. Among them, Cody Gakpo (Liverpool), Enzo Fernandez (Chelsea), Joao Feliz (Chelsea), and Joao Cancelo (Bayern Munchen).

Manchester City won the Champions League 2023/2024 after a tight final against FC Inter (1-0) in Istanbul. Erling Haaland was the top scorer of the tournament with 12 goals. 







Back cover of the LIVE album
The LIVE album includes also 24 stickers with the new signings of the winter market

The LIVE stickers of the Champions League final: Manchester City - Inter

The "next gen" stickers of Gavi (Barcelona) and Palmer (Man City)

The rising star Musiala (Bayern) and FC Inter top player Lautaro

PSG superstars Messi and MBappé

Rodri scored in the 2022/23 Champions League final, while Erling Haaland was the topscorer of the competition with 12 goals

Benzema and Vinicius regular shiny stickers

The "green parallel" stickers of Benzema and Vinicius


Album details:
Full name: UEFA Champions League 2022/23
Publisher: Topps
Release: September 2022
Competition: UEFA Champions League
Season: 2022/2023
Number of clubs: 32
Stickers per club:
  • 25 directly qualified teams (18 stickers)
  • 6 playoffs teams (16 stickers from the update set)
Other sections:
  • Introduction (3 stickers)
  • 2022/23 UCL Team of the Season (12 stickers)
  • 2022/23 Women's CL Standout Performers (11 stickers)
  • The Global Game (18 stickers)
  • Best of the Best (16 stickers)
  • All-time Records (16 stickers)
  • ULC Legends (12 stickers)
  • Women's CL Top Superstars (6 stickers)
  • New signings (20 stickers from the update set)
  • UEFA Youth League (1 sticker)
Updates: Update set (116 stickers)
Extra:
  • Live set (Album + 104 stickers)
  • Parallel stickers
Hardcover album: Yes (Brazil)
Checklist: click here

Total number of stickers (album): 661