From Brum to the Bernabeu, back to Brum

I first held this card at DanzCards’ stand in Macau, about a year before it became mine. I knew straight away that I wanted it. I also thought it was out of reach—and that the next time it changed hands, it might disappear into someone’s collection for years.

Instead, it ended up with me at St Andrew’s, watching Birmingham City against Bristol City. Jude had written “Brum to the Bernabeu” across the card himself. As a Birmingham-born Blues fan, taking it back through the city and into my seat felt right.

That journey, from admiring it in Macau to bringing it home, is why this is THE card in my collection.

A year after Macau

The card is a 2023–24 Topps Stadium Club Chrome UCL Marks of Excellence Black Foil autograph, numbered one of one. I have other Jude one of ones, but this was the inscription I could not see myself finding a better version of. It connected the player I collect to the club I support in his own words.

Seeing it on Danz’s stand meant I had already held the actual card. When I thought about owning it afterwards, I knew exactly which piece I was hoping would come back within reach. With this one, another colour or another autograph would not have been a substitute.

Roughly a year passed between that first encounter and ownership. In my Instagram caption, I admitted I had expected it to end up elsewhere. Being able to post that it was finally mine was the part I had not been sure would happen.

Darren and Gary

None of it would have been possible without my two best men, Darren and Gary. They helped make it happen, and thanking them was one of the most important parts of that original post.

The card now has that connection as well as the football one. Whenever I tell the story of how it came into the collection, they belong in it. It would be an incomplete account to talk about Macau, the inscription and the homecoming without explaining who helped bring those things together.

Jude’s words, back at St Andrew’s

Bellingham’s career took him from Birmingham City through Borussia Dortmund to Real Madrid. The inscription reaches back to the beginning of that journey. For me, that makes it the best Jude inscription card out there: a Madrid card with Birmingham written across it by the player himself.

Once it was mine, I took it through Birmingham and into St Andrew’s. The photographs and reel record the visit, with the card coming along to my seat for the Bristol City game. After first seeing it in Macau, here it was at the ground which gave the words their meaning to me.

I wrote in the caption that perhaps Jude might come back one day too. That was a Blues fan’s hope. In the meantime, I could at least bring this small part of his story home.

The one I intend to keep

It sits at the centre of my Marks of Excellence group: Green /99, Gold /50, Orange /25, Purple /10 and Red /5, alongside this Black 1/1. The black inscription is a different variant from the rest of the run, but it is the one of one I most wanted to own.

PSA graded the card 8 and the autograph 9. Those details are recorded on the collection page, together with the scans. Here, the story is the one I told when I finally shared it: I saw it in Macau, thought I might never own it, and brought it back to Birmingham with help from my two best men.

I could not see it ever leaving when I wrote that post. I still can’t.