One recent morning, Yuki Chong, who is from Hong Kong, and Cliff Borg-Marks, originally from Malta, met in Central so Borg-Marks could film Chong performing taekwondo manoeuvres. Not that Borg-Marks is interested in taekwondo. He is making a documentary about Subbuteo, and Chong, who estimates he is one of about five Subbuteo players here, also happens to be president of the International Taekwondo Federation Hong Kong. 'I think taekwondo can help with technical strategy in playing Subbuteo,' said Chong, also a sports-centre manager.
Subbuteo, which was invented in Tunbridge Wells, England, in 1947 by a man called Peter Adolph, is a form of table football. It involves flicking tiny players around a pitch - hence the well-known motto 'Just Flick To Kick!' which, while not as catchy as, say, Nike's similar exhortation, really tells you all you need to know. If you are British, male and over 30 you're probably feeling a nostalgic pang; one of the Subbuteo websites states: 'Literally, every British schoolboy had a Subbuteo set,' and while one might question that vast sweep it was immensely popular. (As another Subbuteo website fondly puts it: 'Who can forget the pain of kneeling on your favourite player?') Subbuteo is played across Europe - Italy and Belgium are hotspots - but there is one place that remains virgin territory and which may yet show the world its flicking potential. That place is China. This is where Chong and Borg-Marks come in, because they have just returned from Zhuhai and an effort to galvanise the mainland into recognising a hitherto untapped finger force.
'I think it's possible,' said Chong, who has been playing the sport (as aficionados call it, the word 'game' having superficial connotations) for about 10 months. 'Chinese people are still interested in chess and table-tennis, and TV games and ICQ are not so popular, so I think there will be a great demand for it. In Zhuhai, they'd never seen it or heard about it.' On cue, Borg-Marks, who speaks and writes perfect Putonghua, who was Malta's charge d'affaires in 1980s Beijing and an intellectual-property lawyer in 1990s Hong Kong, ran a short film clip he had shot as part of the documentary. It showed baffled Zhuhai people crowding round an outdoor table on which minute objects were being shuttled to and fro by top Maltese player Hansel Mallia and former world champion Gil Delogne of Belgium, whose talents, according to Borg-Marks, are 'God-given' (the finger of God, one assumes).
'Here's an action replay,' said Borg-Marks, as he and Chong peered at the screen. 'Goal! We were pleasantly surprised by Zhuhai. We had lunch with the director of the Zhuhai Municipal Sports Bureau and he called in the principal of a school within the sports complex. The principal was instructed to take Subbuteo on and develop a team. They've made an offer to Gil to coach them ready for the 2005 World Cup in Belgium.' Could the ultimate goal, possibly, be Beijing 2008? 'Too early,' replied Borg-Marks. 'If the Federation [FISTF - the Federation of International Sport Table Football] had money, it could lobby the International Olympic Committee to recognise Subbuteo. But it doesn't have money. Gil is the only semi-professional and he works as a real-estate agent in Brussels, and as a musician. He
is doing the music for
my film.'