The cast of three

The cover has three characters, and for decades each one was a little question mark:

• The man falling backwards in white — the hero of the composition, leg cocked, about to unleash a shot.
• The man rising behind him in a darker shirt, arms thrown skyward.
• The coach in the bottom corner, pointing and — let’s be honest — looking far too thrilled about it all.

Three people. One painting. Several lifetimes of Amiga nostalgia. Here’s how we finally put names to the faces.

The artist: Cameron Buxton

First, the man behind the brush. The illustration was painted by Cameron Buxton, who did the cover art for the entire Kick Off and Player Manager range — data disks and all. And in a lovely twist, he came to us. In 2006, a user called camtheman wandered into the KOA forum and dropped this:

“My name is Cameron Buxton and I am the artist who illustrated the original cover art for Kick Off 2. Due to a recent happy addition to my family I am now reluctantly putting up for sale this original illustration.”

— camtheman, KOA forum, June 2006

A pencil drawing, 330mm × 400mm, framed in silver. When the forum asked the obvious questions — who are the players, and what on earth happened to the main guy’s left leg? — Buxton delivered one of the all-time great deadpan replies:

“Yes the illustrations are of actual players and a manager. Who though, I can’t remember (it was 26 years ago…). The main guy was the only professional player with one leg shorter than the other in the early 90’s.”

— Cameron Buxton, settling the great leg debate forever

…the thread sat quiet. And then, six years later, in walked our own Stainy with the immortal words:

“I have purchased this excited!!!”

— Stainy, 2012, replying to a 2006 thread (“6 years!?!” — SimonB)

Stainy bought the original drawing straight from the artist. As he relayed it: Buxton did all of Anco’s games, and only kept the Kick Off 2 piece “because it was such a huge game.” You can browse Buxton’s full back catalogue of game illustrations in this lovely gallery. There were also earlier forum threads chewing on the same mystery in 2005 and 2007.

The man in the background: Hugo Sánchez

Now to the players. The figure rising behind the hero — arms up, dark shirt — was the easy one. It’s Hugo Sánchez, the legendary Mexican striker, lifted almost pose-for-pose from a 1986 World Cup photograph.

Match the arms to the cover and there’s no doubt. One down, one to go — and the second one would not come quietly.

The man in the foreground: the long hunt

The hero — the falling man in white — was clearly wearing a Crystal Palace kit. But which Palace player? This is where the WhatsApp group went full true-crime corkboard, red string and all.

Our member Steve B turned up a press photograph that matched the pose beautifully — and it was even for sale, complete with the original copyright stamp on the back. He bought it on the spot before anyone else could swoop in. 😄

Ian Wright! Famous, plausible, Palace through and through. Except… something smelled off. The faces didn’t quite line up. Then Mike C produced a photo of a different Palace player — one Andy Gray — and the resemblance was uncanny.

The suspicion deepened when Steve B dug up another shot of Andy Gray whose right-hand gesture was a dead ringer for the cover. At this point a wonderful, slightly unhinged theory was floated in the group chat:

Mike C then did the sensible thing and took it to the people who would know best — the r/crystalpalace subreddit. The verdict came back fast and decisive.

So the press photo Steve B bought was almost certainly mislabelled as Ian Wright. The man on the Kick Off 2 box is Andy Gray — the Crystal Palace one, born 1964, not the Sky Sports commentator.

And then came the moment that put it beyond doubt. Steve B dropped the cover and that very press photo side by side — the cocked shooting leg, the outstretched arm, the AVR-sashed Palace shirt — with the verdict:

“Yes! In fact, I’d say it was drawn from this picture actually… but just imagined from a different angle.”

— Steve B, closing the case

Confirmation from the source

And then, the clincher. Our member Jorn went straight to the top and asked Steve Screech — co-creator of Kick Off 2 alongside Dino Dini — about the cover. Screech replied without hesitation: it’s Andy Gray, Crystal Palace.

Here’s the kicker: Steve Screech is a lifelong Crystal Palace fan. So when an Eagle ended up immortalised on the cover of the greatest football game ever made… let’s just say we don’t think that was entirely an accident. 😏

Beautifully, the 2006 forum thread had quietly nailed it all along. Way back then, a poster called Steve1977 mused:

“I reckon the player standing up about to take the shot is a former Crystal Palace player… Andy Gray (not the Sky commentator) possibly? The coach looks like former Birmingham City manager Terry Cooper. Incidentally, he looks a little too ‘excited’ lol.”

— Steve1977, KOA forum, 2006

Andy Gray in front, Hugo Sánchez behind, and a coach who is possibly Terry Cooper and is definitely having the time of his life. It took twenty years and a frantic day of group-chat sleuthing, but the cover finally gave up its secrets.

It even greeted us at boot

And here’s the thing — this painting wasn’t just on the box. The very same image loaded up on screen every time you started the game. Andy Gray and Hugo Sánchez were the first thing thousands of us saw as the floppy chattered away and the Amiga whirred to life.