Roy of the Rovers Rovers" was published in October 2008, and reprinted strips, articles, short stories and features taken from Roy annuals dated from 1957 to 1971. Two further titles were released in 2009, "The Best of the 1970s and The Second Bumper Book", and a third "Best of", focusing on the World Cup, was released in 2010. All five of the titles were edited and compiled by David Leach. The trade paperbacks: The hardcovers: Roy of the Rovers Roy of the Rovers is a British comic strip about the life and times of a fictional footballer named Roy Race, who played for Melchester
Roy of the Rovers edition in "Shoot" magazine, which had in the late 1980s published a parody called Ray of the Rangers. The comic strip was resurrected in July 1997, printed as short (usually two-page) features in the BBC's monthly "Match of the Day" magazine. These strips ran until the magazine's demise in May 2001. By then the strip's wholesome tone, often espousing the virtues of fair play and strong moral character, was beginning to seem old-fashioned. The editor of "Roy of the Rovers" comic, Barrie Tomlinson, has commented that "everyone seemed to be growing up a bit more quickly, and they wanted stories