On this day, 20 February 1988: Roy of the Rovers
Cover artwork: Mike White
Roy Race – alongside Buster, Judge Dredd and Dan Dare – was one of IPC’s elite characters, fronting his own comic and (as it has turned out) outliving the printed comic form by a couple of decades (although the flame is still burning with all-new Melchester strips on Storky Knight’s unofficial ROTR blog here). His career was eventually ended by a dramatic helicopter crash in 1993, but in 1988 Roy was still player-managing the Rovers in between parenting and comic-editing duties. Roy of the Rovers was a large 296x227mm format by now – a bit inconvenient for a 21st century blogger with a small scanner, but otherwise suitably loud and confident for the bold content within, which seems to reflect well the swagger and brashness that British football carried at that time (English teams were banned from Europe, but this was still pre-Hillsborough, the year of the last truly great Liverpool team and Wimbledon’s ‘Krazy Gang’ FA Cup winners).
Terrible Twins: writer unknown, Yvonne Hutton (artist)
Hamish and Mouse: Fred Baker (writer), Julio Schiaffino (artist)
A rather late plug for the newly-merged Eagle and Battle, which launched a couple of weeks previously
Roy of the Rovers: Tom Tully (writer), Mike White (artist)
Roy of the Rovers: Tom Tully (writer), Mike White (artist)
Billy’s Boots: Fred Baker (writer), Mike Western (artist)
The Partners: writer and artist unknown (possibly John Stokes artist?)
Goalkeeper: Gil Page (writer), Osvaldo Torta (artist)
Goalkeeper: Gil Page (writer), Osvaldo Torta (artist)
