2019 Official NRL Thread (Spoilers/Rumours/Game Results/Discussions etc.)
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COLLECTING rugby league cards was once an indelible part of becoming a footy fan.
From the Allen’s cards of the 1920s to the famous Scanlens of the 1970s and 1980s and the Dynamics of the 1990s, no rugby league childhood was complete without a mint condition Allan Langer, or a Laurie Daley you nicked off your older brother.
For most, this was a hobby we grew out of.
The cards were carefully packed away in a cupboard somewhere and forgotten for years, or handed off to a younger relative, or chucked out by well-meaning but misguided mothers.
But for some, the collecting never ended. Others leave the footy cards behind, but some continue unabated, scouring the farthest reaches of the internet for that elusive number that’ll round out a collection that never stops growing and can’t ever be finished.
Dan Pain is one of those people. The 43-year old boasts an extensive collection of rugby league memorabilia, but his cards alone are a sight to behold.
Pain, who also runs an online store hungry collectors can use to bolster their own sets, owns 29,211 cards, and that’s not counting duplicates.
Card trader Dan Pain pictured at his Spring Farm home with some of his vintage collection of NRL cards. Picture: Toby Zerna
A collector’s card of the now defunct Newtown Jets.
A card for fans of the now defunct North Sydney Bears.
Pain exists on both sides of the card divide — as a collector himself and as a proprietor.
To him, most of the people who purchase cards are doing so for nostalgic reasons, to recapture the wonder they felt as a child when they landed a card featuring their favourite player.
“A lot of people like the old stuff. The biggest thing is when people reflect back on when they were kids,” Pain says.
“They buy the stuff from when they were kids, I’ve noticed that a lot. That’s why (cards from) the ’70s and ’80s are a bit more popular than the stuff from the ’40s.
“People are collecting more from the ’80s and their own eras, trying to finish those sets.”
Nostalgia is a powerful tool, and in part it’s what keeps the rugby league card community afloat.
Potential collectors trawl eBay, Gumtree, swap meets, flea markets, internet forums, wherever cards may be found, more often than not searching for cards that were made more than two decades ago.
The lure is powerful and palpable. Most footy fans of a certain age collected cards at some point.
Finding them again conjures memories and sensations of a different rugby league era in an intangible yet palpable way.
That longing impacts the total value of the cards themselves.
Peter Sterling of the Parramatta Eels.
South Sydney Rabbitoh Eric Sims in 1968.
The Illawarra Steelers’ Ian Russell.
Kevin Ashley of the Eastern Suburbs Roosters.
Sports trading cards are a big industry around the world, with some rare cards going for an enormous amount of cash.
Two weeks ago a Panini card of Philadelphia 76ers rookie Ben Simmons, from the 2016 season when he didn’t play due to injury, was valued at $A200,000.
The most valuable trading card of all time is the legendary T206 Honus Wagner. Wagner was a star of baseball’s Pittsburgh Pirates at the turn of the 20th century and the T206 Wagner, as it is now known, was included in cigarette packets between 1909 and 1911.
Between 50 and 200 were printed, and they have become the holy grail of sports card collecting. When one went up for auction in 2016 it fetched a cool $US3.12 million.
Australia doesn’t have the kind of market to sustain such excess — you could almost buy your own NRL team for $3 million — but it does make sense for the most valuable rugby league cards to be from a similar era.
THE OLDER THE MORE PRIZED
What could be more prized than cards from the sport’s ancestral origins?
Pain has cards in his collection dating back to 1910, which show Dally Messenger, the Adam of Australian rugby league, taking on English legend Jim Lomas in a kicking contest.
He’s got cards that were included in licorice packets throughout the 1910s and 1920s, but these aren’t the cards that fetch the biggest prices.
Nostalgia wins out over logic. People don’t want black and white images of players they only read about it books, they want the cards that make them feel young again, that depict their childhood heroes in all their glory.
“It’s a bit subjective, because sometimes the values aren’t really in dollars. I like things that are rarer. Something from the 1920s or 1910s,” Pain says.
“But people don’t relate to it. The 1963 Reg Gasnier is a good one, that’s over a thousand easily.”
This card of legendary Dragon Reg Gasnier is worth at least $1000.
The 1963 Gasnier was part of an 18-card set featuring some of the biggest names of the day including Johnny Raper, Arthur Summons, Ken Irvine and Ian Walsh.
They were the first set produced by Scanlens, who dominated the market until the mid-1980s.
The sets released in the 1970s have the perfect mix of scarcity and tradition, and are among the most coveted.
The Stimirol- and Regina-produced cards of the late ’80s and early ’90s don’t have quite the same mass appeal and it wasn’t until 1994 that footy cards came back on the scene with the famed Dynamic series.
Sets swelled to incredible sizes, with 655 card varieties printed in 1995 alone.
The rapid expansion of the ARL to 20 teams meant there were more players in the top grade than any time before or since, and thus more cards were produced.
As with so much else of rugby league, Super League knocked the life out of the footy card industry. The Dynamic era was perhaps the last heyday of the humble footy card.
In terms of more recent cards, the 2009 Select Captain cards have been sold for as much as $1200.
But once again, there’s no way to put a final price on any of it.
Demand Demand drives supply when it comes to rugby league cards.
Tellingly, cards have gone out of fashion for young people. The cards produced following the Super League war just don’t have the same appeal.
It may be that in an industry driven by a longing for the past there hasn’t been enough time for these cards to appreciate in value.
The cards people covet are tied to a time and a place, and modern cards, while they’re slickly produced, just don’t have that same tie.
TODAY’S CARDS TOO CLINICAL
Cards from the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s have their own little flourishes that bind them to their era. Be it a dodgy haircut, or the stadium in the background of the player’s photo, or even the club themselves — there’s a certain trainspotting appeal to having a card for a club that is now defunct and the retro appeal of a Newtown Jets or North Sydney Bears card, or the poor, doomed South Queensland Crushers can’t be denied.
Now, players are placed against chrome backgrounds that look like they were designed in a laboratory.
There’s nothing binding them to their own time and place, just blank, empty portraits.
“It feels real, doesn’t it?” Pain says of the older styles.
“The cards these days, they go overboard with the design. Sure, they look good. (But) they don’t have the crowd or anything. They’re sterile.
“(Back then) it was raw.
“It shows a lot of the good things about that era compared to now.”
According to Pain, most of the new cards are bought by adults looking to round out their own never-ending collections.
Kids just aren’t buying footy cards like they once were. The experience that was once so universal is quickly becoming a thing of the past.
“Kids aren’t into cards as much now.
“They’re more into the gadgets and computer games and stuff and cards don’t seem to have the appeal.
“I don’t know if society’s changed or the marketing of them or what, but the people who buy these (the new ones) are adults.”
Collector cards featuring Dudley Towers and Arthur Summons.
Collector cards of the Canterbury Bulldogs’ centenary year.
A rare Panini Ben Simmons gold trading card.
But for Pain and his ilk there’s always another card to find. Maybe it’s a mint condition Tommy Raudonikis from a set produced by the clubs themselves in the late 1970s, or a cigarette card from 1933 featuring Dave Brown.
The world's most expensive trading card - Pittsburg Pirates' Honus Wagner.
Pain has written two books on rugby league cards but admits neither is totally comprehensive. To catalogue every type and variety of footy card released over the last century may well be impossible.
“With the book I published in 2012, a lot of people were calling that the Bible and that’s what they were doing — marking them off on the list ‘I’ve got all these, I’ve got all those’.
“And they were finding errors as well.”
Therein lies the ongoing appeal for serious collectors, to complete the link to the past in a quantifiable way with something you can hold and touch, history that isn’t just words in a book.
Even if footy cards go the way of marbles and slinkies, there’s always another avenue in the past that summons memories of a bygone era, a monument of what rugby league used to be.
I haven't seen that picture yet, was that from the website?
Thanks
The Mad Hatter
OzCardTrader
Anyone know where Newcastle are getting all there money from?
Ponga, Pirces, Guerra.... they just tableded a 3yr dealer worth a fair bit of $$ To Tim Glasby?
Heighenton and Lillyman would be on their last legs. Their coin to Glasby.
Plus Wests Leagues, now Newy owners have very deep pockets.
A strong Newcastle is a must for the NRL.
Brandboy20
OzCardTrader
Makes sense, cheers for that. I know Kaufusi has put off contract talks and Cameron Munster won’t sign till he knows what Bellamy is doing.
Add Smith and Slater to that at years end, Melbourne could be desimated once again.
Brandboy20
OzCardTrader
He’s a good Play that’s for sure, wel I guess only time will tell. Perth live in a bubble, only news I get is the NRL website and the Old man back east lol
The Mad Hatter
OzCardTrader
The NRL player Merry-Go-Round never stops.
You should check out League Unlimited too. Not bad stories and rumours and footy talk.
Brandboy20
OzCardTrader
Haha I will give you that one! I can understand while you are having a good laugh and I see the irony, but ask yourself.... (yes you beat us in the Grandfinal admitted) how does it feel knowing Melbourne have been Striped of more premierships then Cronulla have won in the existence....
(*This is ment for friendly banter and a joke, just wanted to note as text/online writing can be taking in many different ways
Hahahaha and that’s only the ones you got caught for . Only a rort if your not in on it they say . If the roosters have got the salary sombrero, the storm own the hat shop haha.Haha I will give you that one! I can understand while you are having a good laugh and I see the irony, but ask yourself.... (yes you beat us in the Grandfinal admitted) how does it feel knowing Melbourne have been Striped of more premierships then Cronulla have won in the existence....
(*This is ment for friendly banter and a joke, just wanted to note as text/online writing can be taking in many different ways
Yeah true mate , gotta have a laugh .Haha I will give you that one! I can understand while you are having a good laugh and I see the irony, but ask yourself.... (yes you beat us in the Grandfinal admitted) how does it feel knowing Melbourne have been Striped of more premierships then Cronulla have won in the existence....
(*This is ment for friendly banter and a joke, just wanted to note as text/online writing can be taking in many different ways
bigrob2307
OzCardTrader
Brandboy20
OzCardTrader
I cap fits all...... (Sorry could not help the dad joke to save my life hahahahah)
Brandboy20
OzCardTrader
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