Football

Football: Neil Wolfson

What got you interested in the competition?

I’m actually a sports journalist by trade and I saw the story in the press and saw this opportunity as a natural extension of what I do and this design itself was a case of lateral thinking, I sent it off and here I am.

Why did you choose football for your design?

I’m a football fan, I’ve followed the Premier League since its inception and if I had fifty pence for every time someone asks what the offside rule is then I would be a rich man.

What was the inspiration behind your idea?

It was very much an organic process, I had the idea to do offside and given the size of the fifty pence coin face it had to be visual rather than wordy so I came up with this idea and the shapes kind of choose themselves, a circle for the ball, triangle for the attacking team and square for the defending team and the words also seemed to choose themselves. The fiddly bit was trying to get the proportions right.

How does it feel to know your coin is going to be in the pockets of millions of people for years to come?

When the coin is in circulation I hope that people like it, I hope it starts conversations and people are able to explain what the offside rule is and that it provokes discussion.