Jude Bellingham

This is THE card for me. If I had to choose one piece to explain what my collection is about, it would be this Jude Bellingham Marks of Excellence one of one. The rarity makes it special, but the inscription makes it personal: “Brum to the Bernabeu”.

I was born in Birmingham and I am a Birmingham City fan. Jude is the player I collect most, and those words connect his journey to the place that means home to me. An autograph is one thing. An autograph with that message, on the only copy of this parallel, is something I particularly wanted to own.

After buying it, I took the card back to Brum — through the city, around the ground and into my seat at St Andrew’s for Birmingham City against Bristol City. I wanted to photograph it where the Birmingham part of the story belongs. That trip gave the card a memory of my own alongside the words Jude had written on it.

It also sits at the heart of my Marks of Excellence rainbow. This Black Foil 1/1 is a different variant from the other cards in the run, but it is the one I most wanted. The PSA label records an 8 for the card and a 9 for the autograph; the reason it means so much to me cannot be captured by either number.

There are other cards here that I love, and plenty of pickups I am proud of. This is the one everything comes back to: Jude, Birmingham and a personal connection that goes beyond owning a rare card. The Instagram reel follows its trip home.