Object number
M.2015.974
Title
Subbuteo: The Game of "Table Cricket"
Date
1951 - 1951
Creator
Production notes
Leaflet for 1970's game
Material
Size
box: l x w x ht: 13.8 x 15 x 5.5 cm
Description
‘Combination Edition’ Subbuteo table cricket set. Heavily taped blue box with photo-reproduction of an England cricket match. Complete with 22 players, including 2 batsman, 2 wicket keepers and 2 bowlers. Also 2 umpires 2 wickets, (6 yellow stumps) 1 red ball, 2 red ‘batters’ and 2 strips of bent, green celluloid. Includes: Information on Celluloid figures (patent no. 616782); 2 Subbuteo table cricket promotional leaflets and a later instruction leaflet (possibly 1970’s)The Replica of Cricket
Display caption
Subbuteo: The Game of "Table Cricket"
‘Combination Edition’ Subbuteo table cricket set
1951
Peter Adolph (designer)
Subbuteo Sports Games Limited (publisher)
Players: 2
Themes: Dexterity skill game, table game, cottage industry, collectable components, mail order
Marketed as ‘The Replica of Cricket’, the rules of this dexterity game mimicked the laws of cricket.
To replicate the bowling action the ball was flicked towards the batsman. The batting action was achieved by spinning a handle attached to a small plastic cricket bat. The fielding side set out its figures on a moulded plastic base which included a cup-shaped depression to ‘catch’ the ball.
Founder and designer Peter Adolph believed that every sport could be Subbuteo-ised and produced football and rugby versions of the game. The principle of these games was the same, the only thing that changed was the subject matter.
Subbuteo started out as a part-time cottage based industry before becoming a commercial success run from a factory site in Tunbridge Wells. With the upsurge of interest in sport after the war, Adolph wanted to make a game all the family could enjoy. However his main challenge was the post-war lack of materials. In fact, early editions recommended players chalk-up a pitch on an old army blanket; there were other elements of consumer construction such as sticking cardboard figures to plastic mounts.
Later in the development of the game, when the manufacture of elements was outsourced, there was a variety of "extras" that could be bought including scoreboards and boundary fences, as well as the Australian team (baggy green caps), or the West Indians (maroon caps).
The affordability of non-essential household items post-war created a culture of collecting that ran parallel to the popularity of sport in the 1950s. For the first time the average person lived above the breadline and sales of Subbuteo soared, especially during major wins. This triggered a new way in which young fans expressed loyalty to their team by combining imagination and realism, fact and fantasy in the consumption of games.
MCC Collections
M.2015.974
5.13 – Table
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