Football InPrint

Football History Through Magazines

About FIP

Football InPrint is a collection of iconic football images. Over 6,000 and more being added all the time. I'll add anything interesting and anything I feel needs to be saved. You may not like everything but you're sure to find something you do, but if I'm wrong about that let me know.

The site is not meant as an archive but can be used for research or entertainment – The infocus (footballers) section is very popular. Some of the answer are amusing and puzzling. The are over 700 to read but can always add more if you have any but that applies to everything – If you have a collection, maybe something on the odd side like fanzines & you have decent images (min 1000px one side) and you are happy to let me show them please contact me.

About me.

Hi, my name is Dave Langston welcome to my website – well one of them.

This site attempts to save all the iconic images of my childhood but it goes further than that. The was a time in my past when I was unable to buy football magazines on a regular basis. Growing up money was tight & pocket money rare. But when I did find the cash I might buy the Shoot! mainly because it was the cheapest.

Back the most things has their “class” markets. Shoot was always stocked in the shop on our street. Now and then the Goal ! magazine could also be found but magazines like Charles Buchan’s Football Monthly you wouldn’t find. They were far too expensive for our street. So even if I could afford them I would need to go up the main High St to buy a copy and regular orders were out of the question.

In fact, till around 1972 I didn’t even know football magazines other than Shoot! and Goal” existed. But one day I was walking along the road when I saw a box sitting in someone’s garden. Being a nearly teenage kid, I looked inside and saw it was full of football magazines. Looking around the noticed the house was empty and assumed they had been left for the dustmen. So I picked up the box and had away with it sharpish. Heading straight up to the bedroom where I must have spent a few hours examining the pages. This opened an whole new world to me, a world of reading 🙂

Sure Shoot! & Goal! had their article but we bought them most for the images. Football Monthly took it to another level. Although it had great images it also looked far wider than the games played that week or the stars in the game. I suppose what I’m saying is it introduced my to the rich history of the game. Plus a world view and even a look into the future of the game.
By the time these Football Monthlies past my eyes they were already 10-20 years old so I had a lot of catching up to do. I keep those magazines for years but then for some strange reason I gave them all away to a nephew. I don’t know perhaps somewhere inside my I was thinking “This kids needs to get some focus in his life” and these certainly did that for me. But off they went along with all my football programmes I had collected. Little did I know they that these pages that were about to be cut up and pasted on to a child’s bedroom wall would be worth a fiver a pop or more later.
Any way, we move on a few years and I’ve now got a decent job, I’m able to go to the match when I want and I have spare money at the end of the week. Browsing eBay I see the football Magazines of my youth & start buying and buying.

Work got boring and more boring, till I decide to leave. But what would I do? what could I do?
By this time my football magazines had increased a far bit in price. So to get some money in I sold a few & then a few more. But people were still offering my magazines to buy. It was an easy step to go full time trading in football magazines and by the time I had decide to stop I was selling 50,000 a year. That sounds a lot and it is I suppose but I was buying far more. And each collect I bought had to be inspected, with all the damaged one pulled out. This at the end gave me a lot of images and this is what you see on this site. I’ve not bought a magazine for 5 years now.

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