By the end of the eighties the football comic was on its last legs. Gary Lineker’s Hot Shot was meant to be the rescue act. Big name on the cover, slicker paper, a bit of shine. But this was issue 14 of what ended up being just 28 before it quietly merged into Roy of the Rovers.
I had them all. Every single one. Read them, stacked them, looked after them. Then one day I sold the lot for a tenner when I was broke. Not my proudest moment. Wouldn’t even cover a takeaway now. I’d love to say I regret it for sentimental reasons, but really I just wish I’d kept them.
Family Fortune
A proper slice of working-class football. Kenny and Keith Fortune, two brothers who can both play but can’t catch a break. Kenny’s stuck training with the kids. Keith’s older, slower, written off after injury. He proves he’s still got it while Kenny finally walks out. Ambition, pride and frustration in every frame.
Magic Man
Mezino, a Brazilian flair player stuck at Grimthorpe Rangers. The name says it all. The chairman’s up to something, a reporter’s sniffing around, and a pile of sweet wrappers somehow tie it together. It’s mystery, mud and a touch of samba. Grimthorpe was never going to handle him.
Talk-In and Who Am I?
This was Hot Shot trying to be interactive before the word existed. A quiz, a fake interview, a few knowing lines, and a big reveal. Steve Foster of Luton Town, headband and all. The sort of player who looked like he’d turn up for training in a leather jacket and still make the starting eleven.
Striker
Tony Jordan. Captain, player-manager, cleaner of the dressing room. His sub fluffs a sitter, the directors lose patience, and the bills keep piling up. Football without the gloss. Just the graft, the pressure and the ache of responsibility.
The Louts of Liberty Hall
Only in the eighties would someone pitch this. A detention-centre football team pulling a supermarket job while pretending to be on an away match. Syd “Smooth as Silk” leads the raid, the plan nearly works, then someone drops a key. The police close in and the whistle blows.
The Real World
David Rocastle. Rocky. Arsenal’s number 7 and one of the few who carried class and humility in the same stride. Reading that feature now hits harder. He died in 2001, only 33. Still one of the good ones.
Then there’s Lineker in Barcelona, talking siestas and sunshine like it’s just another day at the office. Calm, tidy, professional. The rest of us were still covered in mud, and there he was living the dream.
The Extras
Back pages full of mail-order tat and magic. Hummel kits, team pyjamas, footballs that went flat within a week. A teaser for Willow tucked in at the back. It shouldn’t have worked but somehow it did.
Final Whistle
Hot Shot didn’t last. Not because it was bad, but because football was changing faster than print could keep up. For a half a year it gave us something real though. Heart, humour, hard work and a bit of fantasy.
I had them all once. Sold them all. Can’t get them back, but I can still picture every page. That’ll do.
Verso Media. Nostalgia without the sugar-coating.