The idea of being ‘on the road’ represents different things to different people. For some, it’s about the future laid out before you, for others, it’s about putting yourself in an environment where you can discover things outside of yourself. For most, it’s an away day on the piss following your football team.

So, this month, we’ve tried to merge all three and ditched the office for the road. We’ve travelled the U.K. getting feedback (and beers) from collectors in Scotland, Wales, London and the North East. We’re now back making adjustments to the app as we gear up for our second round of testing with a load of new features, which we can’t wait to launch next week.

Over 500 of you have signed up for the Showboat app so far, a place for collectors to build, show and understand their collection like never before. If you want to be part of the community, we’d love to have you, and you can join here.

Time for Issue #4

📋 Team Selections - The definitive Showboat cultural picks
🍻 Pre-Match Interview: A pint with…CLUBELEVEN’s Justin Amatucci
💥 Showboaters - Those standing out in our community this month
👕 Post Match Clobber - New shirts we can’t get enough of
🏜️ Singing us off - The greatest driving track of them all

Team Selections

↣ Kerouac’s Road: The Beat of a Nation hits cinemas next week, exploring the author’s stories told by “on the roaders” like Michael Imperioli and Josh Brolin. A blinding documentary. RL. 

↣ The Morning of a Budding Life by Isak’s Island is the kind of track you want to start every day with. Root him out. RL.

↣ Americana, the timeless debut novel from America’s greatest writer, Don DeLillo, reimagines the road-trip as a descent into a media-saturated landscape, where travel becomes a search for authentic selfhood. LK. 

A Pint with…Justin Amatucci

Justin Amatucci is Head of Video Production at CLUBELEVEN, one of our favourite football publications. That title pays Justin nowhere near enough credit, though. Not only is he largely responsible for CLUBELEVEN’s stunning visuals, he is also currently travelling North America in an old school bus documenting a side of American soccer culture not seen before, getting to the heart of a little-discussed fan community, on a soccer odyssey.

Hey Justin. How did CLUBELEVEN begin?
CLUBELEVEN began seven years ago when Gabe and Pablo Bayona–Sapag started documenting their local soccer scene in the Northeast. Since then, it’s grown into a community of storytellers exploring the evolving culture of soccer in America through print, photo, video, events, and most recently, our bus-turned-mobile soccer museum.

I think everyone has seen ‘The Bus’ on social media this year. How did it come to life?
The bus started as just a fun video concept - something to get people excited for the 2026 World Cup. But one thing led to another. Tobias, a jersey collector we had previously interviewed, reached out and helped us launch our first print magazine. A dream come true.

And looking back at the original video idea, reinvesting our entire marketing budget into our own bus felt like the only logical next step. What better way to share the magazine than by pulling up to tailgates and hanging out with fans?

Since March, we’ve been travelling across the country following the U.S. Open Cup - a tournament with over a hundred years of history, our version of the F.A. Cup - on what we call “The American Soccer Tour”. It’s been a beautiful way to connect with soccer communities off the beaten path: places like Asheville, Boone, and Louisville.

Asheville was your first stop, right?
Asheville was a special stop for me. When we arrived, the impact of the recent hurricane was still visible. A common theme in our conversations with fans was how the community had really come together, supporting one another in the months since.

There was a lot of anticipation leading up to the match. It would be the city’s first professional sporting event since the storm. The energy was incredible. Kids were running around on a hill next to the field, fans lined the sideline with their folding chairs, and the dorm rooms surrounding the field were packed with onlookers. It felt like the whole city showed up.

I caught up with one of the parents we’d interviewed on the bus. He told me, “For 90 minutes, everything just felt normal again.” It’s a story I share with everyone who comes on the bus - because what this fourth-tier team means to that city is exactly what we’re trying to capture and share with our audience.

Which places have surprised you in terms of their enthusiasm for the game?
Louisville has a very unique perspective. They aren’t in the MLS, but are one of the most dominant teams in the USL, our second tier. And the fans will let you know that. It’s very much a  “everyone hates us, and we love it” kind of energy. They even have their own bus for away days, driving as far as El Paso, Texas. And speaking from experience, that’s a wild drive. It’s awesome to see the passion at every level of the game here.

What’s fan culture like in the States right now?
It’s a mix. Real Madrid can come here and sell out every summer. Yet there are many soccer-loving Americans who know nothing about their local club. We went to Naples, historically known as a retirement community. And at their third-ever game, it’s full of Argentinians who were going wild in an actual supporters section. It was completely unexpected but it just shows there is a grassroots culture developing. People are slowly more willing to turn off the TV and maybe go to a local game on a Saturday. And I think that’s how the game will grow. Through community and building brick by brick, not only through the big European teams visiting once a year.

In the U.K., certainly from a boardroom level, we view America as an opportunity to crack. Is that how it feels there?
We’re a little bit unsure. There are so many commercial and monetary opportunities, sure. But we feel it’s also important not to lose sight of the history of American soccer that’s gotten us to this point. I know many people are keen to downplay it as goofy or whatever, but I think that’s what makes it us. Yes, we don’t have the best league in the world, and we don’t have clubs that have been around for 100 years. But we have had clubs like the Dallas Burn (now FC Dallas) and the New York Cosmos, both with such unique histories that are important parts of the American soccer story as a whole. We should embrace who we are. Why not lean into what makes our culture unique instead of trying to be something we’re not?

Is MLS sleepwalking into a problem with Messi when he inevitably calls it a day? We’ve seen the league dip when the likes of Pele and Beckham left.
The NBA has a similar problem where it's looking for its next star. Obviously, they have LeBron James and like Steph Curry for years and years and now they're kind of coming to the end of their career, and they're looking around for who's next to carry the torch, and those people are hard to find. I don’t think there’s another player that’d draw the same attention as Messi. In the short term I see the positives, long-term I don't think this is sustainable and I don't think it's the best way for us to be building things. As we saw with players like Thiago Almada and Miguel Almiron, MLS can build big players from the ground up that can have a real impact on the biggest stages. I think that’s a better way of doing it, kind of like those tier-two European leagues. 

Tell us the view on the ground ahead of the World Cup next year…
My biggest fear is that the World Cup comes and goes without any plan to capture that momentum to push the culture forward for the next decade. I think it’s all of our responsibility to use the exposure to spotlight the broader stories of soccer in America. Because if all the focus is on one month, what’s left when it’s over?

Half-Time Read

Trains, Chants and Greasy Spoons: West Ham fan and author Pete May delves into the essence of life on the road as a football fan in this brilliant piece.

Showboaters

↣ Nicole Chui’s ‘Ruined’ collection explores shirts as canvases for individuality, stitching new threads into football’s fabric. It’s at OOF gallery until August 2nd.

↣ Neal Heard, founder of Lover’s FC and lifelong Newport County fan has masterminded something special for the club. The shirt takes on Athletic Club’s colours and pays homage to the 56 Basque children who escaped the Spanish Civil War and relocated in Newport.

↣ The always brilliant Peter O’Toole’s side-project, Studiotoole Strip Club, documents kits from the 1980s and adds something new to something old.

Post Match Clobber

↣ Willem II’s sponsors decided to give the shirt back to the fans, and the old-school look meant they sold more shirts in three days than in the entirety of last season.

↣ Austrian side TSV Hartberg very much took the opposite approach with 23 sponsors splattered all over their new kit. It’s bonkers but will probably end up as collector’s item before the end of the season.

↣ Gremio and Umbro celebrated 10 years of hitting out of the park with an instant classic that’s already like gold dust.

That's Issue #4 in the books, and we just want to say we’re buzzing you’re along for the ride with us and what we’re building at Showboat. If you want your shirt collection stored in one place and valued by our team of data-driven nerds, then you jump onboard here. And if you like what you’ve read, do us a solid and tell a mate about us.

Cheers

Lee, Rob, Antonio [at least one is a data-driven nerd]

Before we hit the road and get back in the lab, we’ll leave you with the greatest driving track of them all…