2023 Topps Pristine Road to Euro 2024 is a new product to the Topps soccer card lineup. Everything about this product is a little bit different than what soccer card collectors are used to when opening a hobby box. The “tri pack” configuration means you get the fun of opening two packs plus getting a mag (one touch) card in each pack. See what else you can expect when opening the product.
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2023 Topps Pristine Road to Euro 2024 Details
Checklist – HERE
Box Makeup – Hobby (Search On Ebay) – 6 “Tri packs”, 6 Magged cards, 3 autos and ~5 numbered cards
Print Run – Not known yet as Topps hasn’t released the odds. I’m guessing between 2000-2500 hobby cases.
Rookie Breakdown – No rookies technically but Debutants (National Debut). Here is a list of the club 2023-24 Topps Soccer Rookies as there will be some overlap.
SoccerCardsHQ Review – Let’s get the elephant out of the way early. Much like 2023 Topps Finest Road the Euro 2024 this Topps Pristine product has unlicensed cards from England, France and Germany and Italy. It is also completely missing some of what figure to be the biggest potential hobby stars in Euro 2024 including Kylian Mbappe, Jude Bellingham, Florian Wirtz, Bukayo Saka and Lamine Yamal. That means much like Finest Pristine is a set for collectors of the countries that don’t get a lot of cards. Teams like Hungary, Iceland, Scotland, Slovenia and Wales are included in Pristine but weren’t in Finest. That is great news for those collectors but at a high price point product like Pristine it waters down the product since most of those teams do not have players that most of the hobby care about.
2023 Topps Finest Road the Euro is dominated by autos as you get 3 per box. That is why it is priced higher than more traditional hobby products. As has become traditional with Topps products since Fanatics came in the picture there is one clear chase card in the set. In this case it’s the Cristiano Ronaldo-Erling Haaland dual auto (Search On Ebay) or maybe the Cristiano Ronaldo patch auto if game worn. Problem is the dual auto was the same chase card that was in Finest. That is what happens when most of the hobbies biggest stars aren’t in a product. Another big draw of Pristine is the inclusion of patch auto cards. The good news is that if you hit one there is a decent chance it will be the player you want to hit, Cristiano Ronaldo (Search On Ebay), as there are only 6 different players included. If you happen to be a Bruno Fernandes and Memphis Depay collector, you have hit the hobby lottery as they are the only 2 players on dual patch auto cards. Don’t ask me how Topps came up with that combo as I have no idea. The good news is that Micah Richards aka Big Meeks does have an auto in Pristine. For some reason I don’t think he will be as big of a chase as his CBs counterpart Kate Abdo’s Allen & Ginter.
The inserts look much better than the base cards in my opinion. That’s not saying much as the base design has been widely panned by most. The Pristine Borders, while having a nice design, have seemed to be a bit controversial based on some of the conflicts going on in Europe right now. Pristine Prodigies (Search On Ebay) are listed as case hits on the sell sheet but from what I have seen they are falling more than 1 per case. That is on a very small sample size though so hopefully we get the odds to see for sure. (UPDATE: I am hearing of multiple cases missing a Pristine Prodigies so they may equal out to case hits but don’t expect one in every case.) The Marvelous Moments insert should bring back fond memories and if nothing else you can squint hard enough and picture it as a Rated Rookie. Speaking of rookies, there are some first year players but none designated as rookies. They get the National Debut shield again of which some are actual first year cards while others have had cards for years. The Iconic 11 (Seach On Ebay) are die cuts but they look nice and the players featured are all….iconic.
Topps brought Pristine to soccer to be a mid to high end product. It has been a baseball card product for years and is not very loved. I have a feeling that is going to be the same for the soccer card hobby. If there wasn’t a mag card included in every pack, I don’t think Topps would be able to get away with passing this off as any more than a regular hobby product. It is an awful combination of design, checklist and value right now at $350-$400 a box. I can’t see the resale market on singles to justify the current box prices. If you PC players or countries that are in this product you should be able to get singles for a much better price than ripping or buying into breaks. Topps got lucky that they got this product out while Panini was dragging their feet on Donruss and Select.
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