Football Champions (Wizards of the Coast)

[J.L. Robert]

This was a collectible/trading card game that was printed for 4 years, from 2001-02 through 2004-05. While the game originally featured Ligue 1, EPL and Serie A, only the Italian cards were printed for all 4 seasons.

Each set included foil cards of star players, or of specific teams (French National Team in 2001-02, European Cup Winners Milan and Scudetto holders Juventus in 2003-04)

Not only were the cards very nice looking, the game was pretty good, too.

I went through much expense to obtain cards here in the U.S.A., and I may have one of the largest collections of Football Champions cards in North America.

I'm still looking for several cards, particularly promo and foil cards from the 2003-04 and 2004-05 season sets.

Do any of you remember this game?

 

[Pavle]

Not aware of this card collection. I thought Wizards of the Coast makes magic card games and such?
Do you have any photos to share and a bit more info on these sets?
Would be nice to see those foil cards as well. Are they official cards or what?
Sounds like a really interesting set.

 

[J.L. Robert]

It's the same Wizards of the Coast. The football game element, plus the foil cards created a collectability aspect that fit within their company.

The boardgaming site boardgamegeek.com has a full database entry for Football Champions and other football games, each of which includes discussion forums and photos. I wrote a lengthy article describing Football Champion's history and gameplay which can be read there.

 

[J.L. Robert]

Here's the link to my review of Football Champions:

https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/113159/football-champions-history

And an MS Excel spreadsheet of player stats from the game's first year, including all 3 editions (English, French, Italian), their expansions, and most of the promotional cards issued:

https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/45715/football-champions-2001-2002-full-player-card-spoi