Preorders for the new Subbuteo England Lionesses set have opened on Amazon.
The first new official box set to go on sale in the UK for a year, and the first ever box set on sale that features women’s football players will go on sale on 12 April, according to vlogger Subbuteo Collector. He has shared a screenshot of a preorder of the box set showing a price of £40 and confirmation of the launch date.
The box set is also listed on the University Games website for £40. The retailer is the UK distributor of the game and earlier this week the official Subbuteo brand confirmed the collaboration between the two companies.
Another site, Crafty Arts, has the box set listed for £34.50 but does not have an on-sale date.
The England Lionesses Main Game box set is a groundbreaking set for Subbuteo. It is the first time female players have been sold by the brand and comes just two years after the creation of the first ever female Subbuteo set. That 2018 set was a PR stunt to publicise the Arsenal vs Chelsea women’s FA Cup final and only a handful of box sets were produced. They were given away as competition prizes after the final.
The new Lionesses set follows the launch of a Subbuteo men’s England set early last year, along with a standard set featuring blue and red teams. It will be the third ‘new’ set launched in the UK since Hong Kong company Longshore was handed the Subbuteo license by US toy giant Hasbro.
The sets have come under criticism from some for the cartoonish design of the players and low quality designs.
Other new accessories, such as new fences and a VAR set have also been launched but some of the new products including four new team sets are still not available in the UK. A rubber-backed pitch was also announced by the brand earlier this year but no launch date has been confirmed in a stuttering start to the new Subbuteo era.
