World Cup Football Board Game Exp 3: 1950, 1986, 1990 and Euro 2008

• The first board has the complete 1950 World Cup held in Brazil; a unique World Cup in which 13 teams in unequal groups battle for a top place in their group so that they can compete in the 'Final Pool'. No Final, no 3rd place, it's decided on a group system!! The reverse side of Board 1 is the Knock-out stages of the 1986 and 1990.
• Board 2 has the first 4 groups of 1986 on one side and 1990 on the other.
• Board 3 has groups E and F from both the 1986 and 1990 World Cup. This side of the board is used in conjunction with the relevant side of Board 2. The reverse side of Board 3 is the Euro2008 group stage. Despite each team being ranked in advance of the tournament, the players have the option to re-rank the teams themselves.

In 1950 it was fortunate, perhaps that the final match to be played was between the two contenders, the highly fancied home nation, Brazil and their local rivals Uruguay. Uruguay upset the home fans by beating Brazil 2-1 to take their 2nd title.

1986 held in Mexico and 1990 in Italy were two of three tournaments whereby 4 of the third place teams progressed to the 2nd round. It was a complex mechanism to decide which teams played against each other in the Round of 16 in order to keep teams apart for the rest of the tournament who had played in the same group. Both Finals were contested by West Germany and Argentina - one win each!

The Euro 2008 bonus game will allow players to choose their own rankings. There will be guidelines with a ranking system in place. It will be interesting to see how accurate the guideline rankings are by the time we get to the final on 29 June 2008!