World Record Prices for Soccer Cards!

[Anish]

Where do you see residue on the Quigol?

And yeah, high prices. But I think they will end up looking like bargains.

[aljurgela]

Originally Posted by Anish

Where do you see residue on the Quigol?

And yeah, high prices. But I think they will end up looking like bargains.

The pattern on the back of the card should not be there. The cards are blank backed with writing. I will try to post other back tomorrow.

[scooter729]

I sold an Alifa PSA 9 in 2015 for $5K and thought I did well with it. I even had it posted here for a while with no interest. Damn - wish I had that one back!!

[aljurgela]

Originally Posted by scooter729

I sold an Alifa PSA 9 in 2015 for $5K and thought I did well with it. I even had it posted here for a while with no interest. Damn - wish I had that one back!!

Yeah... that was a super high price back that... you did do quite well... I bought an ALFA 8.5 for less than $2k at an auction like three years ago... WOW... but I do not think that this will be a straight line up... There is more interest now because of the World Cup... things will likely come down to earth for the next couple of years and then go up again. I do, however, think that the days of $2k high grade Pele rookies are over.

[Anish]

Originally Posted by scooter729

I sold an Alifa PSA 9 in 2015 for $5K and thought I did well with it. I even had it posted here for a while with no interest. Damn - wish I had that one back!!

Damn...I wish I was collecting soccer then

[Ulidia]

Interesting to see these trends compared to the soccer memorabilia market here in the UK.


As most of you will be aware, soccer is the primary sport in the UK. By some distance, the main soccer collectible in the UK has, however, been programmes / programs with very little attention paid to cards (unlike parts of continental Europe).


Programmes surged in value in the late 1980s through to the early to mid 2000s and, for the very best programmes, prices could hit five figure sums. However, since then, although those very best programmes have retained their value, there has generally been a considerable decline in value - including for those programmes which, in UK terms, would still be considered as very high end i.e. costing circa $1k to $3k each at their height.


More so, there’s a concern as to collectors ageing and few new collectors entering the hobby - in some respects not too dissimilar to some of the discussion in the US - and exacerbated by the decision of an increasing number of soccer clubs to stop producing programmes in favour of online media.

[Peter_Spaeth]

At least before the Messi/Ronaldo era, the supply of soccer cards seems so tiny compared to the so-called major sports that if there is even a modest uptick in demand, I would think that could translate into substantial price increases. Of course that's a big if.

[Anish]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

At least before the Messi/Ronaldo era, the supply of soccer cards seems so tiny compared to the so-called major sports that if there is even a modest uptick in demand, I would think that could translate into substantial price increases. Of course that's a big if.

I’m not sure if it’s that tiny or if people just haven’t bothered to find and sell them yet.

Of course, the populations of countries like Brazil and Sweden are much smaller than that of the US, so presumably production was lower.

It seems like we discover new sets and cards every day...

[aljurgela]

Originally Posted by Ulidia

Interesting to see these trends compared to the soccer memorabilia market here in the UK.


As most of you will be aware, soccer is the primary sport in the UK. By some distance, the main soccer collectible in the UK has, however, been programmes / programs with very little attention paid to cards (unlike parts of continental Europe).


Programmes surged in value in the late 1980s through to the early to mid 2000s and, for the very best programmes, prices could hit five figure sums. However, since then, although those very best programmes have retained their value, there has generally been a considerable decline in value - including for those programmes which, in UK terms, would still be considered as very high end i.e. costing circa $1k to $3k each at their height.


More so, there’s a concern as to collectors ageing and few new collectors entering the hobby - in some respects not too dissimilar to some of the discussion in the US - and exacerbated by the decision of an increasing number of soccer clubs to stop producing programmes in favour of online media.

Yes, I frequent many UK auction sites and am typically disappointed with the amount of programs and tickets and the lack of cards available. I, for one, am bullish on soccer cards in general and very much like the early UK cards as there are many to choose from, they are attractive and show some of the early football stars. I also enjoy reading the history of the sport. Steve Bloomer, Billy Meredith, Fatty Foulke, GO Smith, CB Fry and many more. I love the Cope's Clips, Taddy & Co. cards especially.

If people globally get more interested in soccer and its history, you could make a case than that will spike interest in the early UK cards globally. I, of course, am unsure that this will happen, but I am a collector first and don't really care too much as I appreciate the learning, the history and, ultimately, the artifacts themselves. A few of my most prized cards in all of my collections are UK cards.

[samosa4u]

$5,000 USD for a Pele card in 2015 was crazy money and 99.99% of collectors would never have done this. Like Scott pointed out, this PSA 9 card was listed for sale on here, and nobody wanted it. Even in 2016, I had a chance to purchase some nice Pele cards for a few thousand, and I thought the seller was out of his mind.

We often spend a lot of time debating over how many of these albums exist in Brazil, but this is something that I care very little about. We need to ask ourselves the following question: what made these soccer cards take off in value in the first place? The answer is PSA. When collectors started seeing these Pele cards in PSA holders, they went bonkers. Do you think those Pele cards on Heritage would have brought in those prices if they had been in SGC holders? Definitely not. Collectors want PSA.

Now the thing that bothers me is that PSA has been closing the door on some of these popular soccer sets. For example, they no longer grade the 1958 Titulares set, and this is very bad. This set has the true rookies of Pele, because it was issued before the Quigols. I've tried to get PSA to reverse their decesion on the Titulares cards, and they have been very polite with me, but so far their answer remains a "no." They are also no longer grading the 1947 Nannina cards, and this set has the Ferenc Puskás rookie. This is another blow for soccer cards.

The question we should be asking here is this: what will PSA do next? What if they decide to stop grading the Quigols? Remember, the #109 Pele has been driving the vintage soccer card market, and if the company shuts the door on this set, then we are in BIG trouble!

That's my take on this whole thing