00:00Subutio was invented in Tunbridge Wells in the late 1940s, but don't let that fool you.
00:18Since then it's gone on to become a renowned modern sport, with leagues across Europe.
00:22And following the success of a World Cup last year hosted in Kent, it's having its Champions
00:26and Europa Leagues held in Favisham.
00:29Now Subutio has most of the same basic ideas as normal football, even including a version
00:34of the offside rule.
00:35But the game mostly hinges on angles and strategy, rather than the power or physicality of regular
00:40football.
00:41Think more flicking, less kicking.
00:42I think a lot of people probably see it as the game that you had and played in your living
00:47room.
00:48You know, your dad might have got it for Christmas and that's probably how most people recognise
00:50it.
00:51Where abroad it's definitely taken more as a sport, there's a lot more technical aspects
00:55to it.
00:56In the chess, you're thinking like five, six steps ahead a lot of the time, if not
00:59more.
01:00And then you've got a kind of a pool aspect where you're looking at angles.
01:03The players are on flat bases now, not curved bases, so they all go in straight lines.
01:08They don't fall over anymore, really.
01:09Now it might not look like the normal Champions League you're familiar with, but I assure you
01:14it is just as intense.
01:16Italy, Austria, Malta, Spain and Portugal, they've all sent their best down here to Faversham
01:21to compete.
01:22And since England are the host nation, that means we get one more team than normal.
01:26And two of them are based right here in Kent, hoping to make it past the group stage and
01:30into the final tournament.
01:31I would say across the country, Kent and Victor is the number four team in the country.
01:37Langton Green, the other Kent team, is number one because they've just got such a wide berth
01:40of good players.
01:41All of ours are very local, so we've been very proud to sort of build that up.
01:46We've got a very strong sense of community in our team.
01:49We're very welcoming to newcomers, we're very good at building up both the youth scene
01:52and the development scene for new players.
01:54That's kind of our specialty.
01:56So as a result, any new players who wish to get involved, we're the best team to go to
02:00for that.
02:01So we're very proud of that.
02:02Now what surprised me most about the game was its speed.
02:04I managed to watch a match featuring the world ranked number one player, Carlos Flores, who
02:08would run around the table at points to get a shooting angle.
02:11Some flicks were so fast it actually almost looked like a sort of dribbling with the figures.
02:16Kent and Victor's aim for the tournament was to get past the group stage, but they ended
02:20up losing against their first few opponents, finishing 12th out of 19 teams.
02:25In the end, the frontrunners, Italian club Lazio, won the Europa League, with Spain's
02:29AFT Turia and Belgium's Racing White Walluer in second and third.
02:34This means just like football played on a pitch rather than a table, we were held back from
02:38a trophy by Italy and Spain.
02:40But at least like England's World Cup qualifiers, no matter how the Subutio teams perform, they'll
02:45always be top of the table.
02:49I'm Lynn McDermott for KMTV in Fabersham.
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