I’ve read a few good books this year, but none as life-affirming as the Mexico ’86 World Cup Panini sticker album or the 1984 Christmas edition of the Argos catalogue. Both are similar in that they feature straightforward images of things that distracted me when I was a kid, accompanied by brief, plain descriptive text. And yet both have had a profound impact on my social life in 2025.
These nostalgic compendiums have not only reignited a small sense of wonder in my jaded heart, but also helped forge new bonds (and strengthened old ones) with men like me who have let friendships slip as we stumble through middle age.
They say male friendship is in crisis. Recent research suggests one in 10 men feel lonely but are unable to talk about it, and that 15 per cent of UK men between 55 and 64 have no close friends. Some say that the solution is for blokes to open their hearts. I would suggest it’s much easier to open an old sticker album or catalogue and take it from there.
It all started in the summer when I was at the pub with my mate Ollie, whom I first met at nursery school in 1979. He had arrived with a mysterious orange carrier bag from which he theatrically produced a slightly worn copy of the Mexico ’86 Panini album. Ollie had bought it on eBay a few days earlier for a not insubstantial fee. He had done so because he had owned the same album as a kid and had lost it somewhere along the way. This frustrated him.
Once he had replaced it, he thought: “What can I do with this useless but expensive artefact I have impulsively purchased?” And he realised that he had to talk about it with someone else who understood the sense of excitement it gave him. That someone was me. I asked if I could handle the album and began to leaf through it gingerly, savouring every last page and every single sticker, pointing at the forgotten players and reading out their autobiographical information in hushed tones.
There were other men there that night, too: my pal Rory, also in his fifties, who had grown up on the other side of the country, never knew Ollie and me back then, but immediately responded to the sticker album with the same sense of euphoric recall. And even my 13-year-old son Lenny, who wasn’t born in 1986 and had no memories of the World Cup or the stickers, was immediately drawn to the album’s retro appeal. A couple of blokes on the neighbouring table couldn’t help but peer over our shoulders and join in our reminiscences.
Since then, the group has grown: at least once a month, we meet around the same table at the same pub and discuss the latest sticker album (usually from the 80s or 90s) we’ve procured online. Nerdy? Yes, of course. But the albums are a social lubricant: they give us an easy conversational entry point that soon widens into deeper recollections of childhood and reflections on life.
Delaney has enjoyed male bonding over nostalgic items such as sticker albums and items from the Argos catalogue (Photo: Teri Pengilley)Sometimes we might even share our feelings or show our vulnerabilities. Or not. It doesn’t really matter. Contrary to much of the discourse around men, friendships and mental health, not every conversation needs to be emotionally vulnerable to be healthy. Sometimes, just talking bollocks about stickers really is enough.
“I think when people are nostalgic, they bring to mind happy relationships from their youth,” says Tim Wildschut, professor of social and personality psychology at Southampton University. “It might be that we recall people who were kind to us and who we were kind to – grandparents, parents, friends. It gives us a sense of happiness and positivity about ourselves. We can be good, valuable friends who can share in other people’s experiences.”
It doesn’t even need to be a shared passion like football – it can be anything that sparks easy-going discussion, shared cultural references and misty-eyed silliness. I have been hosting a daily podcast with my friend Andy Dawson for the past eight years called Top Flight Time Machine. It started as a football show, but we soon branched out into all sorts of other nostalgic subjects we found entertaining, and built a decent-sized, highly engaged audience of like-minded listeners. The pod has been downloaded over 25 million times since we started out in 2018, and we’ve sold out live tours across the UK on numerous occasions.
A community has formed around the pod, mainly rooted in the ephemera of childhood nostalgia. Sometimes it’s old comics (we dedicate one episode per week to deep-diving copies of Roy Of The Rovers from the 80s) and sometimes it’s pop music (we do regular discussions about randomly picked top-40 singles from yesteryear).
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Few episodes have been as popular as the ones we did this year about the 1984 Argos catalogue. We found a meticulously scanned archive of pages on the Archive.org website, picked pages at random, pressed record, and just started talking. The response from listeners was incredible: from conversations about ironing boards to shower curtains, Star Wars figures to calculators, it became clear that humdrum consumer items were catalysts for profound conversation.
The Argos catalogue is more than a compendium of retro domestic durables; it is a portal to cherished moments and poignant memories. We receive emails from listeners who were emotionally triggered by our discussion of a cheese grater or a description of a 10in black-and-white TV. Memories of family dynamics, childhood homes, faded friendships, or treasured pets are thawed like fossils preserved in ice. Dusty corners of our minds are unlocked for the first time in decades; new parts of our souls are touched. We glimpse the lightness with which we once carried ourselves. We are reminded that life can be brilliant and that, often, brilliance lies in the tiny things.
It’s not about living in the past. And it’s not about the sort of revisionism that claims everything was better in the old days. It’s more about finding new ways to connect with other humans, share daft memories, spark bits of forgotten joy and remember the better sides of ourselves.
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“We have found that nostalgia makes you more fun-seeking,” says Wildschut. “A characteristic of nostalgia is that it is stuffy and conservative. But research shows the opposite: nostalgia can be activating, fun and optimistic. When people grow nostalgic, they become more inspired and optimistic; they want to make new friends and try new experiences. It’s a reminder of life’s possibilities, the things you were capable of when you were young.”
Yes, it can be very healthy for men to be vulnerable with each other, to share feelings and make meaningful, emotional connections. But it’s also okay if they just get together and have a laugh. Being silly, talking rubbish, sharing jokes and indulging in pointless nostalgia for simpler moments of our younger days – this is the stuff that often makes life seem more bearable. It is a release valve amidst the stress of mid-life malaise.
There is a purity to the fun: just blokes, leaning into a more juvenile side of themselves, putting aside all the serious and boring cobblers that all too often dominate our minds. If you want to rebuild a few friendships – or start some new ones – in 2026, looking back might be a good place to start.
Listen to Top Flight Time Machine on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts
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