Flick-off for table football fans

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By Gavin Walker BBC Scotland reporter Advertisement

Flick-off for Subbuteo fans

There have been some big football games at Hibernian's Easter Road but this weekend it is hosting something much smaller.

Top Subbuteo table football players from around the world are coming to Edinburgh to play a major international tournament.

It may be small-scale but they are big on talent.

Top teams and players from Denmark, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Italy and Spain will be taking part.

High standard

There will also be teams from Scotland, England and Wales.

The team ranked number one in the world, TFC Mattersburg, and the losing finalists of the "Subbuteo Champions League", Real Murcia C.F, will also take part.

Scottish Sports Table Football Association president Mike Burns said: "Three of the top five teams in the world are coming.

"It is probably the highest standard of tournament we have had in Scotland."

The game was launched in 1947 and remains popularLaunched in 1947, for decades Subbuteo was the must-have game for Scottish football fans.

But in this digital world of hi-tech games consoles, it may seem strange to some that these insubstantial figures have not long ago been given the flick-off for something more modern.

David Baxter, from the Lothians, is a former Subbuteo world number one.

This Pele of the plastic pitch said there were players of all ages.

However, he said the best players were the older ones, who had been at it longer.

"A lot of the younger players at U-19 level are very good and they could win the open category, which is the main category," he said.

"But I would say the average age would be approximately late 20s."

Subbuteo may seem outdated but its survival and its success is all to football's net gain.