2010-11 Kits
Posted by John Devlin
At last and just in time for the end of the season (!) I have finally completed all Premier League and Championship kits illustrations.
They can be viewed here:
http://www.truecoloursfootballkits.com/10-11-kits
If you have any comments on the kits or notice any omissions please leave them on this page.
Liverpool 2010-11 Kits
Posted by John Devlin
To wrap up my reviews/summaries of all Premier League 2010-11 kits are Liverpool’s three strips for the season. I posted a detailed initial review of the home on its unveiling back in July. Nine turbulent months later for Liverpool my opinion is still pretty much the same. Looking at the other new adidas kits that have appeared in the past few months its good to see that they gave Liverpool a unique outfit. I have warmed to the design slightly but am not really a fan of the shadow pattern used throughout which seems to dull down the vibrancy of the shirt. The gold trim is a nice touch and something I would like to see used (with care!) on future Liverpool home kits.
Always good to see the Reds away from home in white and black and the 2010-11 adidas nearly, but not quite ticks all the boxes. I think my main issue with it is the effect of the black red and gold pinstripes. Pedantic maybe, but using three colours here seems to create thicker stripes that look too heavy for the shirt somehow. Its a nice idea but I wonder if there was a better way to incorporate the three colours into the pinstripe design? Still, the rest of the kit gets my thumbs up especially the socks with their black and red turnover.
The third Liverpool kit for the season sees a return to black (yet again), this time trimmed with a bright, flurescent yellow. The shirt fabric incorporates the same shadow pattern as the home but for me the whole strip is a tad dull and doesn’t really excite me. Its seen a fair bit of use this season though and the yellow colour has formed the main theme of a lot of the club’s European training wear. Best part of the shirt for me is the fact that the Liverpool crest has switched to yellow with only the flames retaining the red colour (a trick also included on the recently unveiled 11-12 away kit)…but don’t get me started on the Liverpool crest…
The Arsenal Away Kit Situation
Posted by John Devlin
Denis Hurley recently pointed out to me that on the Arsenal website they are stating that, bizarrely, the club will wear their yellow/redcurrant away kit against against Blackpool this weekend:
http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/blackpool-v-arsenal-kit-selection?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+arsenal-news+%28News+Feed%29
As the official Premier League handbook and the Arsenal site itself clearly state that the club’s third kit this season is last season’s navy strip it is very odd indeed that they are opting for the yellow kit that will clash with Blackpool’s tangerine – especially, as Denis points out, if there is bright sunlight.
The mystery deepens as I have been reliably informed that the kit room at the Emirates has never received a stock of the navy kits for this season, casting doubt as to whether this is an official third choice or not. In this day and age its madness that clubs can’t wear kits that clearly differentiate them from each other.
The Arsenal site has been known to get some of the finer details wrong when informing people of kit choices but on the whole it is pretty accurate.
So what will Arsenal wear? We wait with baited breath…
Website problems
Posted by John Devlin
You may have noticed a couple of glitches in the site last week. Many apologies for this – it was due to switching hosting and although the move went pretty smoothly unfortunately the last 4 months worth of kit graphics disappeared. I’ve almost finished uploading them all again, please bear with me and all missing kits will be up shortly. Thank you.
Coming up soon:
Liverpool 10-11 kit reviews (completing the Premier League series)
An invitation to vote for your favourite Premier League kit of the year
All 10-11 Championship kits
Champions League last 16 away kits
Wolverhampton Wanderers Kits 2010-11
Posted by John Devlin
Swiss sportswear company Burrda arrived in the UK with several kits for the 2010-11 season although the only outfits appearing in the Premier League are the ones they have produced for Wolves. I have to say I’m pretty impressed – although I can’t quite put my finger on why! The home shirt sees a collar return to the famous old gold shirt with neat black panels on each shoulder and down each side. Shorts and socks are fairly predestrian. I think where Burrda have succeeded where other new sportswear brands have failed when they have attempted to break into the British market is that firstly the kit fits really well – no baggy outsized jerseys – and secondly that they have kept their design traditional and simple and not attempted to make too much of a ‘brave’ design statement. My only slight criticism is that it is odd having piping on the shorts and yet not on the rest of the kit but this may be explained when we look at the away kit…
The away sees the return of the ever-popular all-black Wolves strip. Following a tried and tested change kit policy the strip simply reverses the colours of the home (maintaining the design) and simply adds a different neck design. The black shorts differ from the home pair in that they feature a broader old gold trim that is a far more logical match to the side bars on the shirt. In my view these shorts would have worked better with the home strip as well but clearly the club wanted to differentiate between the home and away pairs.
New owners for Admiral
Posted by John Devlin
Like many football kit followers of a certain age Admiral hold a special place in my kit memories. The brand has made several revivals since its late 70s heyday but with the exception of one or two smaller deals has been pretty quiet of late in the UK football world.
However, this looks like this may all change as exciting news emerges that Admiral is now in the hands of new British owners, a move that will hopefully see the re-energising of a great sporting icon, across Europe.
The new owners are Admiral Sportswear Limited, a special purpose vehicle established to acquire the rights to the Admiral brand for Europe, the Middle East and North Africa.
The move sees Managing Director Jonathan Hamburger, heading up the new Admiral Sportswear Limited business and the appointment of former Umbro, JD Fashion and West Bromwich Albion executive Tim Gardiner, as Sales & Marketing Director.
Originally established in Leicester as Cook & Hurst Limited, the Admiral business was incorporated in 1914, when the company designed and manufactured underwear for the Armed Forces.
With the recent resurgence of heritage sportswear brands in the sports and fashion markets, there are dynamic plans to develop the Admiral brand with football performance for the sports retail sector and also lifestyle fashion developments for the menswear sector.
The plans include the introduction of three product collections for Admiral; Football Performace for the pro and amateur markets, Admiral “Gold” a brand new fashion concept and Lifestyle, including retro inspired “back catalogue” Admiral products, drawing on Admiral designs from the 70’s and 80’s.
Commenting on the acquisition, Jonathan Hamburger said;
“We’re delighted to have acquired such an iconic, British sports brand, with nearly 100 years of heritage and believe the opportunities to re-energise and grow the brand throughout Europe are endless”.
“An important part of the future success of the brand is the building of a strong and experienced team for Admiral and I’m delighted to have Tim Gardiner on board as we now look to develop our plans for the UK and the appointment of licensees throughout the territories we own in Europe and other countries”
With such big plans and experience behind the acquisition of Admiral it will be interesting to see if the brand makes it make to English football’s top flight…
Ticker Tape and Taping
Posted by John Devlin
I thought I might draw your attention to a little piece I wrote for Umbro in conjunction with their new Diamond Icons range of leisurewear. The post concentrated on a pivotal moment in both Scotland’s and Umbro’s history:
You can read it here:
http://blog.umbro.com/post/ticker-tape-and-taping-%E2%80%93-the-legacy-of-argentina-%E2%80%9878/
Champions League Last 16 Kits
Posted by John Devlin
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- Arsenal H 10-11
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- AC Milan H 10-11
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- Barcelona H 10-11
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- Bayern Munich H 10-11
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- Chelsea H 10-11
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- FC Copenhagen E 10-11
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- Inter Milan H 10-11
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- Lyon E 10-11
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- Manchester United E 10-11
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- Marseille E 10-11
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- Real Madrid H 10-11
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- Roma H 10-11
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- Schalke H 10-11
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- Shakhtar Donetsk H 10-11
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- Tottenham Hotspur E 10-11
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- Valencia H 10-11
Now that the Champions League has reached the last 16 I thought it might interesting to check through the home kits of the clubs that are left. It’s a mixed bag, but of course with virtually all the clubs changing their kit every season this is always going to be the case. But on the whole I think the good outweighs the bad. Soccer Betting
The best kits for me include Roma (but how can you go wrong with that superb colour scheme?!) with the reversed stitching across the chest, Real Madrid – elegant all-white from adidas as ever, Schalke’s simple but strong blue strip and Nike’s Inter shirt that introduces a new twist (or should that be zig-zag) on the blue and black stripes.
The Kappa kits are strong – especially Valencia’s and I’m fascinated by adidas’ continuing experiments with outlandish kits for their French clubs. Both Marseille and Lyon are in the last 16 and as usual they are sporting completely different kits to their regular home and away (although both European home kits are also their domestic thirds – confused?!) The Marseille outfit I think really works and I love the subtle red, yellow and green stitching throughout but the Lyon shirt is just too much in my view. Yet so many adidas/French shirts are favouring this ‘in your face’ approach to kit design these days – its especially common in the country’s domestic rugby outfits as well.
The weaker designs in my view include AC Milan with the stripes just not working for me and Barcelona, which for some reason just doesn’t seem powerful enough…plus I don’t like the neck!
On top of that of course you have Spurs’ special all-white European shirt (with different sponsors to their regular Premier League jerseys) and Manchester United’s white socks.
Just for the record, the split across the manufacturers makes interesting reading with adidas dominating: ADIDAS – 7 KITS, NIKE – 5 KITS, KAPPA – 3 KITS, PUMA – 1 KIT
West Bromwich Albion Kits 2010-11
Posted by John Devlin
West Brom kits always seem to be a bit hit and miss with me but I can’t put my finger on why. Maybe its the fact that the navy is often so dark it edges the colour scheme towards black and white and the overall effect is neither one thing or the other – I don’t know. Having said that the club’s 2010-11 home kit is one of the side’s better outfits in recent years. Like the Sunderland kit it borrows the trappings of Umbro’s late 70s strips for the club including the zig-zag trimming on the stripes and even going so far as to reinvent that jersey’s button-up neck (courtesy of an adaptation from the previous England kit). The shorts feature a simple trim along the leg and the socks are as plain as they could be. After a couple of years wearing shirts without a regular sponsor this year the Baggies have struck a deal with home emergency repair experts HomeServe who have decided to include a huge logo featuring their cunningly constructed phone number.
Away from home the club seem to have taken the advice of Spinal Tap’s Nigel Tufnel and gone for a design that is ‘none more black’. With no contrasting trim whatsoever this mean, moody and magnificient strip’s only concession to flair is the inclusion of very subtle shadow stripes. In my view its simplicity makes the outfit one of the better black strips knocking around at the moment – its plainness means the necessary logos, badges, crests etc are presented clearly without clashing with the design. My only criticism is that as a set I would question whether the black of the away kit ‘clashes’ with the navy of the home.
West Ham Kits 2010-11
Posted by John Devlin
Up until this season I haven’t been the biggest fan of Macron kits. Having seen them close up during a Southend v Leeds game last year I was amazed at just how big and baggy the Leeds kit seemed and how this style made the outfit look very dated. However I worked on some Italian team Macron kit illustrations last year and was amazed at how much better their designs for continental sides seemed.
So I was delighted to see that for 2010-11 Macron are making kits for several English teams and all of them are a vast improvement on some of their previous strips. The ones provided for West Ham are, in my view, superb and manage to bring the heritage and history of the club together with some really nice, but not over-fussy detailing, and a very contemporary look and fit. The home shirt reminds me a bit of the Pony home kit from 1995 with its formal collar and simple pale blue sleeves (constructed with interesting panelling). The neck of the collar is adorned with two gold stitches arranged in to a cross (symbolising the club’s hammer motif) and the gold is continued on the cuffs as well. I don’t even mind the large Macron logos on the shirt and shorts! Its a classic design that works just as well with the away kit’s pale blue shorts and socks that have been designed to mix and match perfectly.
On to the away kit….another great design that resurrects the club’s late 50s/ 60s away kit of white shirt with a single claret and single blue horizontal band. Its an iconic design and its surprising that a revamped version hasn’t made a reappearance in the Hammers’ kitbag since its original incarnation. The shirt features identical stitching and panelling to the home kit – the only main difference in terms of construction is the inclusion of a pale blue crew neck and cuffs.
Two great kits from Macron, both with a superb fit – I wonder if we’ll see the famous pale blue with two claret hoops strip next year, or are West Ham due a navy away kit?
