SPAIN FIFA WORLD CUP 2002 PANINI ALBUM

Over the years popular Italian sticker company Panini had some curiosities or some mistakes and some other so-called problems.
Back in the days we had some player mistakes like putting the wrong picture. Using photoshop to create stickers is normal even today. If they are missing a picture of some player needed to be in the album they just cut his head and paste it on some other player’s jersey.
 
Problem with license not being given from some football federations. We all remember Iran stickers not being printed for the 1998 WC edition. Then we have England and their FA. Today’s story is about the Spanish national team and their football federation.
 
Because of the image rights between the Italian company and the Royal Spanish Football Federation. So for the 2002 WC album we have Spain national team players pictured with their club jerseys instead of national team uniforms. Same thing appeared two years before with the 2000 UEFA EURO Panini album.
 
So for example we have this crazy team photo. Instead of the RFEF emblem we have a Spanish flag. In 2001 Panini published an album under the name “Superliga” for the 2001/02 La Liga season. Panini used the same photos for this La Liga album and one for the World Cup in 2002. Only difference is the background. All stickers used in the “Superliga” album have the same green background. Player pictures for the WC album are bigger and seem like they have an original background.

 

Here you can see all Spanish player stickers from the 2002 WC album compared with ones from 2001/02 Panini La Liga album. Only two of them played outside Spain. Both Guardiola and Mendieta played in Italy for Brescia and Lazio. If we compare their stickers with the Calciatori Panini album from the 2001/02 season they are completely different.

Spain FIFA World Cup 2002 stickers:

-Spanish flag instead of FF emblem

-crazy team photo with player's heads