Adding the final touch to the adidas ball for the final

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A few days after the draw for the sixteen teams that made the 2012 Orange Africa Cup of Nations finals had been conducted in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, work started on preparing the match balls for the entire competition out at adidas in Germany. All the match balls at the Gabon and Equatorial Guinea carried the inscription of the two competing teams, the match venue and the date. Back at adidas in early November the group stage match balls were prepared with the writing on the balls done using a pet printing method.  According to Peter Sauerhammer  a graphic designer and screen printer with adidas Group this is the first time the printing of the match balls for every match (32 of them) at Africa Cup of Nations finals has been done.  For each game sixteen (16) match balls are printed. The match balls for the group stage games were printed in Germany using a technique called pet-printing.  

Peter Sauerhammer travelled to Libreville arriving in Gabon on the 1^st of February to work on printing the match balls for quarter finals until the very end. “So l follow the action on television watching the knockout matches and once l get confirmation from CAF on the teams meeting in the next match l start my work”  said Peter Sauerhammer.

A different printing method was used from the quarter final stage. “Instead of pet-printing we use heat-transfers and this is so because, there are a few requirements needed among them colour chemicals for pet-printing but with the heat transfer method not so much material is required “ said Peter Sauerhammer . We made the heat transfers back in Germany and each team had 35 made. An equal number was made for venues and dates too. Basically the process of printing on the match ball involves cutting up the letters required and laying them out on the transfer before l stick them on the ball and press on the ball with a machine that generates 160 heat temperature for  10 seconds . I give it an additional 5 seconds for safety before l remove the tape to inspect the work, added Peter Sauerhammer as he demonstrated in his Libreville hotel office while working on the 16 match balls for match N0 32. That is the final match of 2012 Orange Africa Cup of Nations and there it was printed on the match ball

ZAMBIA : COTE D’IVOIRE

            FINAL

LIBREVILLE, STADE DE L’AMITIE

         12.02.2012