France sign deal with Nike
Posted by John Devlin
Its been announced this week that after 40 years together the French national football team are saying ‘au revoir’ to adidas and will switch to Nike in 2011 for their kit supply. I suppose for football fans of my age adidas and France go together like a baguette and brie and it will seem very odd not seeing ‘Le Bleus’ in adidas. However, with modern football kit contracts loyalties are abandoned in favour of a solid financial deal and strong brand promotion and there is no doubt that Nike are masters of both - as well as being experts in good design. Some design relationships naturally run their course and perhaps the France/adidas link up was in need of a breath of fresh air. Ironically enough after ALWAYS wearing white as their away strip, Euro 2008 will see the French play in red - an adidas innovation that was perhaps too little too late.
It will be interesting to see how Nike interpret the French outfit. They certainly reinvented the rugby strip bringing in an elegant navy blue in favour of the country’s traditional shade.
With Umbro’s sale to Nike looking imminent it may not be too long before the English national football team sport the swoosh on their famous white jerseys.
4 Responses to “France sign deal with Nike”
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March 8th, 2008 at 5:57 am
Wow - amazing news. As you say, France have always been an Adidas team, so joining Nike is a big step.
My personal feeling is that I don’t like France’s all-dark-blue rugby strip as much as the usual ‘blue shirts and white shorts’ thing, but I guess there’s no harm in trying a new look once in a while.
Judging by the Scotland shirt vote I’ve been doing on my own website, the two all-dark-blue strips they’ve had are more popular than any other they’ve had. Interesting stuff…
As for France wearing a red away shirt, I think that’s going to blow my mind when I see it in action! Strange - very strange….
April 5th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
It would be rather interesting to see what Nike comes up with given that France and Adidas have had a partnership for several decades.
I hope for the sake of the French fans that Nike don’t follow in the footsteps of the rugby team and almost “rebrand” the French team by ditching the “tricolore” for a dark blue kit. I’m an avid rugby fan too and watching France lately has often made me mistake them for Scotland because of the colours they now wear.
Anyway, even those pre-release photographs of the new 2008 Adidas range leaked in the middle of last year had the French shirt matched with blue shorts which didn’t go down too well with some of the French guys on some discussion forums I go on, I can tell you. Thankfully they stuck to the old blue-white-red combination but it does make you wonder how long for in this age of tradition being thrown out of the window.
April 6th, 2008 at 5:25 am
It seems recent tradition is going out of the window with some of the new Euro kits and instead kit designers are going further back in time for their inspiration.
May 9th, 2008 at 6:32 am
Nike with France? i remember being amazed that the rugby team switched again, like their football playing countrymen
adidas & France ( whatever sport) was almost nateral.
This of course means that adidas are going to have to find a team to replace them as an A list euro side, so Italy leaving Puma after their latest contract ends, or maybe perhaps Portugal or Holland switching over.
Also the rumour of Germany transfering over to Nike will not go away.
Herr dassler like to blog in here?