Hate the Liverpool home – plain and boring, the only saving grace is the return of the Liverbird, and in answer to the controversy re. the Hilsborough tribute, the twin flames and the ’96’ on the back of the collar arguably give more exposure than everything being squashed into one badge. But why, oh why, didn’t they give it a white V-neck? one tiny detail could have changed a glorified polo shirt into one of the all time great retro/modern combinations. As far as the rest go, the Nike kits are just missing something in my opinion – best home/away sets come from adidas – Chelsea kits are classy, Swansea’s are simply stunning – away is gorgeous, using the Welsh colours is inspired. And on a final note, what is going on with Macron? their kits are just weird – I know it’s Championship rather than Prem, but Leeds new away kit has the most bizarre shorts design I have ever seen!
…I think Villa are wearing something similar as well Martyn! Difficult to get them across in my illustration style. Something about Macron I kinda like though
After some of the horrible change kits Chelsea have had in recent years, the white shirt with the sky blue sash looks really classy, and the faded effect on the three stripes looks brilliant. The home is not too shabby either.
Aston Villa have a really nice home shirt, but the less said about the monstrosity that is the change, the better.
Im not too impressed with the Man City home (mostly due to the monotone badge, though this does work better than on the current England kit), but I am very impressed with the change shirt, which has a wonderful burgundy and gold colour combo.
I’m not usually a Nike fan but really like the Arsenal kits. I just hope they look as good in the flesh as recent Nike kits have looked a bit ‘cheap & nasty’
A lot of sites seem to be carrying pictures of a grey & white Liverpool third kit which looks fantastic but there seems to be some doubt as to their authenticity.
Isn’t the Liverpool third kit supposed to be purple? I’m I heard somebody mention that, as they criticising it for now really helping alleviate clashes, with the black away kit?
Excellent work, as usual, John!
Just some thoughts…
I love the Chelsea home kit. Simply stunning, and kind of appropriate now with the gold after the Champions League win. As most people do, I really like the away too.
The Liverpool home kit is great. Really smart from Warrior to just keep it simple. Especially after like seven years with the mandatory Adidas stripes. Not too sure about the way though. Just a bit too busy.
Man City home is nice, although I think it would have been better with plain black socks.
I don’t like the Arsenal kits, at all. The away is just an abomination, and is symbolic of Nike seemingly losing their minds. The home would have been fine, had it not been for the red stripe on the sleeves. Just odd.
The Everton away kit is good. I know that black kits tend to get a hard time on here, but I like them. Just simple and classy. The home is rubbish though, those cuffs, blimey… it looks even worse in action.
I like the Fulham kits. I have a soft spot for Kappa. There kits never seem to really change, and I mean that in a good way.
I’m not usually a fan of Macron, but I think their kits for Villa this season are okay. The home kit is very big though. I’m fine with the away, although I know most people hate it. I know fluorescent yellow is a bit out of fashion, but they have really run their course with white and black kits at Villa Park – so it’s nice to see something different.
Can’t wait to see the next lot…
Just out of interest, will you be doing article about the new kits, John? Also, will you be illustrating the new Championship kits?
I’m a bit surprised there hasn’t been more discussion about the Man Utd home shirt. The gingham effect is terrible.
I am not a fan of the Liverpool away shirt, didn’t like grey and black in 2002-03 either but I think Warrior have done a great job with the home. It’s exciting to see both Warrior and Under Armour in the Premier League.
I think that’s because the Man United home has only been uploaded in the past hour, or so, along with the Newcastle away, and Man City away.
Yeah, the Man United home is awful. Just more proof that Nike have lost their minds. On that subject, I’m sure I heard that their away was going to be the same, but blue, but there are pictures going around of a white (in a different design) kit as the new away today…
EricGeneric: The blue United “away kit” you’ve seen is actually one of the keeper’s shirts.
I agree the Gingham is dreadful though. So galling to see City get so many classic kits in recent years while Nike give us rubbish like this. Suppose they’ve got that to look forward to next season though.
Rumour on the ground is that Arsenal will return to adidas from next season 13/14. To be honest this years Nike set are absolutely dreadful. Cheap looking rubbish. If that is how they plan on Kitting out Arsenal in the future then good luck to them. I actually don’t mind the gingham on United’s kit strangely enough.
best kits are liverpool’s home and city’s away. dont know how arsenal will manage away from home against villa or west ham this season. im assuming a white or yellow third kit will follow.
Most disappointed with Everton kits from Nike, well the home, as the away is quite smart but the home ones looks like average team wear kit and im presuming it is due to lack of team name on socks (which is usually the tell tale sign between team wear and bespoke with Nike and Adidas) and also them using the park gk kit where arsenal have a different design. Much preferred the Le Coq effort last year
Personally, I don’t think Arsenal will have a problem wearing their new away kit against Villa or West Ham, but they probably should retain the yellow kit again (obviously, it would pointless retaining last season’s blue away kit) just incase. I don’t think they will be launching a new third kit. None of the big Nike teams (Man United, Barcelona, Arsenal) seem to anymore, for the past three or four years. It seems to be a new home kit, and a new away, with last season’s away being the new third kit.
Actually, Arsenal are in the Champions League and I think you need to register three kits if you are playing in the Champions League or Europa League.
@David1986
Yeah, it seems Everton have took over from Fulham (from a couple of years ago) as the average Nike Premier League who don’t get unique designs…
By the way, what do people think of the Newcastle away kit? Have they used maroon as a change colour in the past?
The new Man.Utd home kit is awful,worst effort so far from Nike,its being marketed as ‘Made of Manchester’ as a referance to the cotton industry in Manchester.The irony being that the cotton trade died a death because of cheaper materials from the far east where the shirts are now made.
Couldn’t agree more john. I am not a fan of Man Utd but it’s interesting to read that even their fans don’t seem to like it. I’m all for experimentation (up to a point) on kits, but I thought it looked bad in pictures and then I saw it ‘in the flesh’…oh dear. One of my favourites now added to the site is the Reading home – restrained and classy use of red for the shoulder flash, and wider hoops that make the sponsor stand out better. Puma really seem to THINK about kits, unlike Nike and to a lesser extent Umbro who just seem to throw ideas out and hope that they stick. Honourable mention also to Kappa and the Fulham away – orange is an unusual colour choice for them, but with white and black is really classy.
With you on Reading, Martyn. That new Puma template has been modeled in XXL by the likes of Sheffield Wednesday but Reading have worn it in the right size and it looks fantastic.
Notice that the (short) sleeves are still slim cut but are now longer. Sure it’s either following fashions (what do I know?) or just trying to step away from the pack. Looks great either way, as does the larger profile sponsor and use of red. One of my favourites for the new season.
What are people’s thoughts on the kit? I don’t like it at all, really. It’s just trying to be too clever. Maybe I am boring but I think they would have been better off with a basic Adidas design, in a red shirt, white shorts, and blue socks.
I do agree, Eric, but I would have liked to see the proper UJ colours used instead of that turquoise colour – I wondered what Stella McCartney was thinking when I saw it unveiled! But it’s true – if it had been designed by the adidas team instead of a fashion designer it would have been much nicer. Missed opportunity in my opinion. Nb. They should have stuck with the initial designs as modelled by Gareth Bale last year.
nike have done 2 nice kit’s for Celtic this year. not sure about both kit’s having dark sock’s though. the Arsenal away has the same design as Celtic’s away.
I think there is a rational explanation for Everton having teamwear kits. The deal with Nike was only signed back in March, and I’ve read that Nike get their bespoke kit designs off the drawing board and into production well in advance of the following season. As a result of the deal being signed after the cut-off point, Everton had to settle for teamwear designs in the colours of their choosing, which have a quicker lead-time for production. I know this happened with Galatasaray, who signed a late deal with Nike and had to wear teamwear designs in their colours last season.
They have a bespoke set of kits for this coming season, so my guess is that Everton will follow suit for season 2013/14.
I know Fulham wore a few Nike Teamwear kits a few years back, but their deal was with Just Sport, who I think also arrange deals with other clubs wearing Nike Teamwear style designs.
Eric, David, Martyn & Denis, the Away shirt is white with very light silver/grey Union Flag stuff. Personally I would have liked to have seen GB wear white shirt, blue shorts and red socks like the hockey team (who didn’t really get the Stella McCartney treatment it seems http://bit.ly/PqNUIf, save for the bizarre ladies’ skirt).
Plus, and I do go on about this but I maintain it’s a valid point http://bit.ly/HpZil8, the Team GB shirt has one navy sleeve and one predominantly white sleeve, so it’s about time we had baselayers that matched. In Blackburn games last season you had players with one white sleeved forearm and one blue (wearing long sleeves) and some with two white sleeved forearms (wearing short sleeves over baselayers).
Also, am I right in thinking that national association logos are banned from the Olympic football tournament? So what Brazil were wearing last night would go against regulations and they’ll have to put a flag over the crest?
How does it work in terms of national association manufacturer v olympic kit manufacturer? Will Spain wear adidas or something along these lines? http://bit.ly/OfXNsT
Jay,
My understanding is that the Great Britain situation is unique in world football – it’ll probably just be the badges that change, as you say. Sweden ladies played GB last night and just wore the same Umbro kit that the ‘full’ team wear, so Spain will probably do the same – obviously the star for the World Cup win will be removed, but I would expect it to be the EC ’12 template – of course, adidas brought out a special Spain kit for the last Confederations Cup, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they do the same for the Olympics.
Yeah, that’s what linked to, Denis. It won’t be that though, will it? That’s a leisure top or shooting or something isn’t it? Look forward to seeing it if it is that brand. I quite like the track tops http://bit.ly/LAZ5fO
It think it’s inevitable that Spurs will wear a goalkeeper kit outfield against West Brom.
That spain gear is awful,is it supplied by the same firm who make the fake barca/real madrid/man utd etc gear you see hanging outside beach chops in Spain!
Really? I don’t think it’s a problem, although I know you have more of a problem with “overall clashes” than I do, Denis.
I remember going to West Brom versus Sheffield United during the 1999/2000 season, as I was living near the Hawthornes at the time, and Sheffield United turned up in their away kit, which was white-black-black – against Albion’s navy/white-white-white – and I had no problem with it.
Maybe in practice Spurs in the away kit won’t be that much of a clash, I can recall Newcastle wearing home shirts with white shorts and socks away to Wimbledon in mid-90s.
Though I’ve just realised that WBA’s home has navy sleeves this year, so maybe not
The worst bit about the West Brom v Sheffield United game from 99/00 was the fact that the Blades had retained the previous season’s illuminous yellow away strip as a third choice kit. Why didn’t they wear that?
It’s annoying when a team has a change strip which resolves a kit clash issue but wears a home or away strip which results in a clash. Arsenal did that at Blackpool last season of course.
As for Spurs, someone in their management who decided on the kits should have realised that the silver/black kit is completely superfluous and does not in any way resolve colour clashes for the home and away shirts. Whilst they may get away with wearing navy at Newcastle (given their new home kit is 80% white), the West Brom fixture is a different proposition.
Ironically Newcastle had a pointless away kit in the 02/03 season in silver and some bluey-green colour, which they ended up wearing at….. yes you guessed it, West Brom, on the final day of the season (a shocking kit clash).
I guess I was the only who didn’t have a problem with the Albion/Sheffield United kits then? haha!
I just found a picture of the Arsenal/Charlton game from 2000, Denis. I really don’t see the problem. I guess I just don’t get this “overall clash” thing. I mean, I see your point, but I just don’t agree.
You have to go with “does the home shirt clash the away shirt”, “do the shorts clash with the shorts?” and “do the socks clash with the socks?”.
To be honest, I think that is the way most referees look at it too…
I’m not so sure that they do Eric – for example, take Watford v Southampton in the 2003 FA Cup semi-final – Watford changed from red to black shorts and socks, which were Southampton’s normal first-choice colours, and the Saints had to wear white shorts and socks.
Looking at something in a close-up picture is fine and it’s easy to tell teams apart, but in a match situation, where it often seems like a blur of players, it can be very difficult.
Like I say, I see your point, I guess we just have to agree to disagree buddy 🙂
I suppose it’s the whole teams wearing the same colour thing, which I have a bit of a problem with. What I mean is, I remember when Chelsea played Birmingham in the FA Cup last season. Chelsea obviously wear blue-blue-white, and Birmingham’s change kit is yellow-white-white. But Birmingham changed to blue socks, because of Chelsea wearing white.
I remember you saying that “Birmingham changing to blue socks, actually caused more of a overall clash” Meaning they maybe should of wore white sock, like Chelsea. That just seems all wrong to me. I’d rather there be more of a “overall clash”, than both teams wearing the same colour socks.
Did I say that it’d have been better with Brum in white socks? If so, then I’ve changed my mind now as I don’t think two teams should have the same socks either, they should have had yellow!
Oh and similar to Arsenal-Charlton, in 2008 at the Emirates Liverpool wore their home shorts and socks with their grey away, caused quite the confusion
I’m with Denis on this one. Something to consider is perspective with one player standing yards behind another. White, blue, white can be confused with blue, white, blue in the eyeline to seem like, at a glance, two players are teammates. This is particularly important for the linesman when deciding on offsides when there’s a crowded area.
I agree that no teams should wear the same colour socks – that’s even more important, for tackles etc – but if there’s a socks clash then the replacement socks chosen should not be in the colour of the opposition’s shorts.
…This is why I see method in the madness of the – supposed – one colour kits Uefa directive. Italy vs France is generally all blue v all white (or all white v all blue) and if it was blue, white, blue v white, blue, white or even white, blue, white v blue, white, red then it could cause difficulty for officials and compromise the ease of viewing for spectators.
the worst kit clash i saw was my team Ipswich wearing their abbot ale sponsored cream(ecru) and back striped kit 2 years in a row at West Brom. even worse that one of the games was an evening game. seasons involved were 96/97 and 97/98. 96/97 town had the green and maroon away as a third kit as well. the only difference was Ipswich’s kit had black short’s.
Anyone see the Team GB-New Zealand women’s game? Don’t worry if you didn’t, they’re rubbish, but I assume New Zealand’s women’s wear white as Home colours whereas they were wearing black and Team GB were in the white Away (shorts and socks are boring and plain).
The only thing I can think of is that because NZ were representing the Olympic team they were wearing the colours of that, which are probably predominantly black.
Also, France’s women were wearing adidas teamwear (reasonable style) rather than Nike so it does look as though Spain will be wearing something resembling the crap we’ve seen in pictures. Looking forward to that.
Wow, some GREAT comments here people, True Colours visitors are definitely the most intelligent football kit commentators out there!
Interesting to hear the clash arguments. Personally in theory I don’t have a problem with white shirts against striped shirts – however with designers these days obsessed with not keeping the stripes simple you do get occasions where there is a large proportion of white (eg on sleeves/yokes etc) where it does become an issue. Look at Man Utd’s 70s/80s penchant for wearing blue at Arsenal for example. The WBA/Sheff Wed was a good example of a situation that although wasn’t a drastic clash per se, visibilty all round for both teams, refs and fans could have been improved with sensible kit selection. Which is the point Denis made about Arsenal vs Blackpool a season or so ago.
In this day and age with awareness and experience of kits at a peak there is no reason why the teams cannot be attired in a way to make them clearly different. Surely it makes the refs job easier (although interestingly this is a topic that no pundits ever pick up on!) and makes the players jobs easier.
Anyone noticed Blackburn’s kits for next season? Blue/white halved home, navy away and white third….lights touch paper and stands back…
Questionable alright John (especially if they are drawn away to WBA in a cup), though the navy should just about work against royal and white sides, as it did for Everton a few years ago
I saw the new navy blue away kit being promoted, and just assumed they were retaining the yellow away kit from last season, as the third kit for the new season.
46. Jay, why should Albion change at home because of another club’s poor planning?
The Baggies kit does seem to be a problem for some clubs. I was at the Newcastle game and it was awful, as was the Stoke game last year. Our home kit had a lot of white last year, meaning dark kits were fine. This one has far more navy, so it should be interesting!
They shouldn’t, but as they have often worn navy shorts and navy socks (though curiously not recently together) as first choice home items I didn’t think it was too much of an affront to their identity.
I doubt I need to assert again that my preference is Spurs wearing a goalkeeper kit.
Yeah, but if Tottenham have nothing to change into that’ll help, which is the problem, then my idea is a solution.
I actually don’t think Spurs wearing ‘keeper kits would work. It’d have to be the green and it would actually look ridiculous. Not like if England wore their red gk kit…
It just seems to happen less and less, that’s all. It seems that nine times out of ten, the home teams just wears their away kit.
Like the season before the last, which I think was the last time it happened in the Premier League, in the match between Aston Villa and West Ham. A few years before, it would have been West Ham having to borrow that white Villa kit.
That’s the way it should be, as it is their fault, as the away team.
Although, teams wearing different branding is probably a much bigger issue than it was at one time.
I just noticed on the Arsenal Wikipedia page (I know! Before anyone says anything) that they have last season’s navy and light blue away kit, as the third kit.
Has this been confirmed anywhere?
Seems pointless. You would think they would have to retain the yellow kit again…
Yeah, that’s been a confusing thing about the new away. They do need a light change kit and the only way would be to keep the 2010-11 Away for a third season (reverting to its original crest). I actually expected a new release third kit, which would be poor form for Arsenal, but surely they won’t keep the navy and sky blue thing.
…Unless they want to unveil a new range of Nike baselayers with alternate sleeves! If Van Persie toddles off then the new captain might be into that.
The Everton kit is nice, but it would look so much better with white socks. Last year’s blue socks looked good because of the amber trim, but this year’s kit should have white, to make it look more like an Everton kit, as opposed to so many teams that wear blue-white-blue kits.
Currently reading Paul Lake’s autobiography and there’s a picture in it from a game which is a good example of why solving a shorts clash can add to overall clash IMO.
In 89-90, City wore their away shorts at Villa, but rather than go with a mismatching sky-maroon-navy, they changed socks too:
Just seen Chelsea’s new third kit – another stunning design from adidas. They will now be one of the best dressed teams in the Prem. Simple combination: Home – Blue & gold; Away – White & sky blue; Third – Black & yellow. Covers every eventuality, avoiding clashes as described above. Anyone agree?
Yeah, agree, Denis. Though I think the efforts now being put in to avoid “overall clashes” might spoil us a little and if we see games like that Villa-City example we may get lazy and tell ourselves we can’t make who’s who when really it’s not that bad.
Martyn, like the Chelsea Away, though the gradient on the stripes I think is overkill. Should’ve saved that for a plainer template. The sash was enough on that kit.
I think the Third is a great one to wear to football training but not ideal for wearing with jeans (I’m not being ironic here). adidas obviously decided they’d underused the “coloured abs” approach from the France 2010 World Cup shirt and it’s obviously done with techfit in mind. I think it works for its purpose but just on basic aesthetics (and on a standard replica) it’s a bit too modern.
Erm, if a lot of you guys weren’t happy with the West Brom v Sheffield United kit clash from 99/00 – what will Chelsea do at the Hawthornes this season? It seems to me they can’t wear the home or third kit, so that means the away, no? 😛
Jay – Think we have to agree to disagree on that one. I’m an FC Bayern fan and I love our new third kit with the orangey red flashes on the chest – provided it’s not too OTT (like the mid 90’s Umbro paint splash effect used on Forest and Aberdeen to name but two) then I think its fine…the Chelsea one I thought was snazzy without pushing things too far.
Eric – Anticipated this one! I would think that as the WBA is mostly navy, Chelsea will use the standard away shirt, which is light enough to avoid clashing, with new shorts. The last Bayern away kit was initially unveiled with navy shorts but with the majority of red teams in the Bundesliga also wearing dark shorts adidas soon came out with a white alternative pair – maybe they will issue a sky blue pair to go with the shirt? Alternatively I can think of loads of occasions where a team playing primarily in blue use a black away kit against a blue & white striped team – maybe the amount of yellow will be seen as enough differentation?
I reckon Chelsea’s away kit will have a pair of navy alternative shorts, to match the socks. They do have an alternative set of white socks for the kit too, having worn them in pre-season.
As for their choice of kit for the fixture at West Brom, I reckon they’ll use the home kit, it contrasts with West Brom’s new home shirts which are predominantly navy.
Last season Chelsea wore black, but that was down to West Brom’s shirts being predominantly white, plus the home shirt had the large white panels on the shoulders, which might have caused an issue.
I’ve never seen Chelsea wear their home kit at the Hawthornes. Must have just happened to miss Match of the Day on those weeks!
Interesting that Albion wore their home kit at Stamford Bridge in 05/06. They did at Birmingham also. You would have thought that at both Stamford Bridge and St. Andrews, they would have just worn the white third kit.
I think if they can get away with it a lot of teams will try to wear Home kits in local derbies. Newcastle-Sunderland being a prime example.
With you on that again, Denis. The best thing for Chelsea at West Brom will be to wear their Home, probably with the change Home socks http://bit.ly/Pcxims
Martyn, I don’t necessarily have a problem with all garish details on football shirts, what I mean is that techfit shirts (or shirts with techfit in mind) that accentuate contours of a muscular physique probably don’t work too well on an overweight chap in the Blackbird or wherever before the game. It’d be a little bit like the copy, er, bats in The Dark Knight.
Jay,
Fair comment – I remember those skin tight Kappa shirts from a few years back – thankfully they didn’t supply Bayern kits! It’s not uncommon for kit suppliers to ‘map’ the outline of muscles on shirts – Nike did it a few years ago. I don’t neccesarily think adidas designed it purely with Techfit in mind though – they seem to use Chelsea away/third shirts to wildly experiment – I’m thinking of last seasons black with the sky blue ‘net’ on it, and I seem to remember their first away shirt (or it might have been third) was flourescent yellow! Interestingly, John has now added the Swansea away – I think that one is stunning as well.
One final point: Which bright spark at Umbro had the idea of getting rid of Southamptons traditional stripes for their return to the Prem? Surely a striped home shirt, and a yellow and blue away (ie. a bit of tradition) would have been the best policy?
I know they’re not in the Prem no more, but just seen the Blackburn third kit that John said about in post no. 60…… a crazy decision to choose to wear a white third kit, and also looks like an off-the-peg Umbro effort worn by lots of lower league, Sunday league and pub teams.
Mind you the way Venky’s run that club, I’m not surprised.
Back to the Premier League and as for Southampton, I heard their new kit has divided the Saints faithful. It looks more like a recreation of the final Umbro kit worn by the great Liverpool side in the 80’s.
It isn’t the first time Southampton have strayed away from the traditional stripes, such as the “reversed Ajax” kit from the early 80’s as worn by Kevin Keegan and co, the red shirt from 1985, and the half and half Hummel kit which was almost identical to the Danish kit from 1986….. but all those kits had black shorts and white socks for contrast. This is just an all-red strip that smells of “re-brand”. The away strip reminds me of Sunderland’s kit made by Le Coq Sportif in the early 80’s.
Though I’ve heard the yellow and blue away strip from last season is going to be retained, but not confirmed yet.
I don’t like these ‘rebrands’ that seem to be going around at the moment – I think the Cardiff situation is just horrendous. Being a fan of your books, I know which kits you mean, but the ‘reverse Ajax’ Southampton was a partial compromise between stripes and plain. As you said though, they at least had the black shorts to keep a part of tradition going! I personally am dissapointed by the majority of Umbro kits for this coming season – I don’t know if it’s the uncertainty of Nike selling the company, but I get the distinct impression their heart has gone out of it – too many templates are being used ad infinitum, where Nike, Puma, and adidas at least vary the trim/collar/shadow combination. All the more dissapointing when back in the mid 90’s they were nigh on untouchable. Anyone agree? What about Man Utd fans? would they rather have the classic Umbro home kit from 94-96 (with the Old Trafford shadow pattern) or this seasons gingham monstrosity?
…Not a fan of Nike’s new kits, as you can probably tell! New Arsenal home isn’t bad though – the arm stripes which people seem divided on reminds me of a sort of RAF/mod/Ben Sherman motif…Away shirt is hideous though.
If anyone wants to see a truly ridiculous clash, have a look on ITV player for the 8th July edition of the Big Match Revisited. Skip to the last game (through numerous adverts) and you can see Coventry wearing their TV kit, which had a sky blue T covering most of the front with a white back and a black number. They were playing Manchester City who were wearing white shirts… with a black number. From behind they look identical. I assume City only had the 2 kits at the time.
Something even dafter I remember from a few years back was Port Vale wearing black and white striped shirts with a plain white back and black number. They were playing Lincoln, who rather than wear their home red and stripes all the way round wore their away plain white shirt with a black number. I can only assume they forgot the home shirts.
Back on topic, Man City’s home kit would be greater if it had navy instead of black. QPR’s kits aren’t up yet, but if you want truly pointless, what’s the best colour to use for a 3rd kit if you wear blue and white hoops? Sky blue of course. I suppose they could wear it against West Brom…
Nice kit but utterly daft as a playing kit, though doubtless it’ll sell as well as any other kit. Possibly not as bad as Blackburn’s kits, which are.blue and white halves, blue and white. I suspect they might need a 4th kit for Sheffield Wednesday.
For the last 2 years whenever we (Barnsley) have played Sheffield United/Doncaster (Red/White Stripes/hoops) We’ve worn Away (white) shirts – I dont think the Referees are too fussed about it.
Changing the subject…..I was watching ‘The Big Match Revisited’ recently from February 1983 and Arsenal were away to Middlesbrough in the cup. Being of a certain age and an Arsenal fan I remember the game well. What I can’t understand was ‘Boro (being the home team) wore that seasons red shirt / white shorts but with blue socks. Arsenal wore their tremendous green and blue of the time. Does anyone know why ‘Boro changed socks that day (the regular socks that year were white.)
Not sure, but on that Arsenal green kit, its been usurped as the worst change kit the gunners have had by this seasons effort IMHO. That template has been used by quite a few teams quite well (PSG, Monterrey, Kaizer Chiefs), but the Arsenal shirt is awful. It could have been decent if it was gold/yellow for the shirt and blue for the shorts.
Also, considering Reading are playing in the Premiership, its a bit of a let down them playing in cheap teamwear this season, the style used by the African teams or the top puma style would have been so much nicer than something picked from a catalogue.
Also, the new Norwich home kit is very nice, but as its very similar to the old one, was there really a need? Norwich have played in shirts with green sleeves, halved shirts and have had white shorts and black shorts in the past, so its a bit dissapointing not to see errea (Who have made some awesome kits in the past and made really good shirts for Boro in the past) sticking with yellow shirts/green shorts/yellow socks.
Thanks for that Denis, quick one for you: Cork and Galway will lock horns again shortly, are you (like myself) thinking that neither team will change? (for those who are unaware, the Cork colours are red-white-red, Galway maroon-white-maroon and it’s rare that we see a change strip when they play). Agree with ‘Spiderbait’ about the new Arsenal away – a total disaster and embarrassment to a fine club.
Ronan, IMO there is zero chance of a change. Galway wore white for a football league game in 03 and Cork did so in hurling, but other than Galway wearing maroon shorts in a few meetings in the 80s, these are the only changes apart from the 1973 All-Ireland football final.
Re Boro, they had been forced to change socks in previous round v Notts County and Malcolm Allison decided to keep the blue for remainder of cup run
A mate of mine said it all about the Arsenal away shirt….. “looks like one of them hoodie tops worn by 15 year old emo girls”…… priceless!
I’d be surprised if Arsenal did retain the navy/turquoise strip from last season as a third strip, but mind you the yellow kit was no longer for sale this time last year and did get used against Milan…… though why they didn’t wear it at Villa I don’t know. We’ll have to see when the Premier League Handbook gets released, it did say July 2012 but whether that is just to the clubs and not in the public domain I’m unsure, but will be interesting to see the third kits that haven’t been revealed yet.
I’ve seen teams wear plain red against claret (blue sleeves) in the past, but not for a good while. The last example I can think of was Man U wearing red at West Ham in 1996, possibly because they had lingering jitters about their grey kit before it went postal at The Dell.
I know Villa wore their home kit at Arsenal in 1999, but that was when they had the broad claret and blue striped kit. They wore alternate sky blue shorts that day too, though they had a turquoise third kit available which wasn’t called upon.
But as for plain claret, maroon, burgundy, cardinal red, whatever you want to call it, there’s usually been a change against a team in plain red.
From what I can gather, the yellow away kit Arsenal had that season wasn’t available until a few months later. In fact I remember they wore the previous away kit (navy with turquoise thunder flash) at Liverpool in the August, on TV.
You’re right about the 96-97 Arsenal away Jon, I remember McManaman scoring twice in a 2-0 win. I think yellow and navy was first worn at Old Trafford in October (Winterburn og)?
That is stupid, to me Liverpool always wear red unless there is a clash…… also FK Homel’ wear a Hibs-like green and white, so unless it was the white sleeves that did it, who knows?
I can’t imagine them wearing it at Anfield…..
They’re getting like those French teams with their bizarre changed coloured strips in Europe.
I really would not like it if that were the case, it would be a sad day, especially for a club like Liverpool with such a strong pedigree of winning in Europe wearing red
Talk about a marketing fail. It’s officially the Third Kit but it’s first choice in Europe? At least adidas/Nike call kits released with that in mind “European” or “International”.
Saw a father and son wearing it in Cardiff earlier – father short sleeves, son long – and it doesn’t really seem purple. Navy with the slightest purple hue perhaps. Certainly not the “nightshade” of colour charts.
Couldn’t agree more Denis, Spurs should always wear blue shorts. I’ve always thought that they’ve looked good in white shorts when they do play in Europe, can’t explain why though but I believe that’ve done it since the ’60’s (and this is from an Arsenal fan!), obviously a tradition of theirs and not a bad one. But other than that they should be wearing blue shorts and every Spurs fan I speak to seems to agree. Luckily for us traditionalists they will wear blue shorts in defeat at the Emirates this coming season………
Not a hope in hell of ever seeing Man Unted in red shorts ever again. Strange to think that they wore that combination years before their old buddies along the M62 ever did.
Or Chelsea with blue shirts and white shorts, I’d imagine.
Odd how they had no problem doing it as recently as 1990-91 (AFAIK), but then just stopped, even though Spurs would change for games at Stamford Bridge
Not kit related at all so I apologise for going of topic but In Leeds game against Preston yesterday I’ve noticed that the Leeds team featured White, Gray, Green and Brown. Has a team ever featured more ‘colours’?
Im not sure what all the fuss is about the Man U home kit. I get the design is not for everyone but on the pitch the gingham pattern has a subtle effect and the actual design of the shirt with the black v collar and lack of piping and trim is undestated and classic. I think people feel the need to hate on it because it is United mostly. The white away kit is in a different class though. Really nice.
I don’t think it’s that Noel, I don’t like Man U at all and I loved last season’s home, quite like this year’s away too, apart from the shorts, just think that pattern doesn’t belong on a kit
I wasnt a big fan of last seasons home kit. The collar seemed odd and the overall feel and quality of the shirt wasnt great. This seasons if you can get past the gingham ( and I realise that is a big ask for some people lol) has a much better overall design and quality. Gotta say though after watching the Real Madrid game this evening I am very impressed with the Madrid home jersey.
As a United fan i can’t stand the home kit,its awful,looks like a thermos flask!! The Away kit at least goes back to the traditional away colours(in my eyes) but its not perfect,the badge needs to be in colour and the shorts are checkered for some reason,the best bit is the socks!
I wonder what kit Liverpool will wear in Europe after being drawn against Hearts? Home shirt clashes with maroon, the Euro away/third clashes with maroon, the away kit is dubious due to the contrast in UEFA’s colourblind eyes…..
I saw Man U’s away kit in action the other day, the shorts make it look like a pyjama set in all honesty….. though not as bad as Celtic’s “international away kit” tartan shorts effort in 2009!
Loved those shorts, Jon. Won’t hear a word said against them. A pal constantly winds me up by reminding me that he has a pair and I don’t.
Liverpool will probably wear the black Away against Hearts. With Hearts wearing white shorts it shouldn’t be too bad.
On a somewhat related note, has anyone ever known a club to change kit manufacturer but keep the same bespoke lettering and numbering font? Incredibly cheap from Liverpool and in my own twisted head they’re now a laughing stock (due to this in particular, wags) whereas no one else has probably even noticed.
On a totally different sport but sportswear related,did anyone notice that whilst Great Britain(i refuse to use the marketing term ‘TeamGB’) all wore adidas in all sports,Germany..adidasland..wore different manufacturers in different sports.Thought all their gear would have been adidas? Even saw Germany athletics team in nike!!
AJ, I don’t actually believe that it was a pre-planned (or adequately planned) decision to keep the font, rather a marketing oversight. Is it not the third season of that style? I understand it’s likely to have been produced with Sporting ID in discussion with the club rather than adidas but a new kit should have a new font, as Chelsea have despite not even leaving adidas.
I agree with the white continuing despite the gold details but something could have been created to complement the style of the new kit. Retro white numbers with yellow/gold outline perhaps?
Surely the Man City kit manager would have known that the mauve kit would have caused a clash with Chelsea? To confuse matters even moreso, the yellow strip that Pantilimon wore was already prepared with logos and fonts applied, he even changed shorts and socks at half time…. why couldn’t he wear that from the start?
As for the thing about Liverpool carrying over fonts to a different supplier, I think Tottenham are doing likewise by wearing their custom typeface in cup competition. Also I know the FAW did it with the Welsh kits when changing over from Champion to Umbro in 2010.
Fabulous knowledge, Jon. Thanks for that. Still don’t agree with it but can partly understand Spurs doing it as their Euro name/numbering (especially the latter) are great.
Didn’t see Shield, was it difficult to tell teams apart? Is it the case that sky blue will be City’s best option at Stamford Bridge, as their away is dark too?
You know something, I kinda miss teams having their own typefaces on their shirts, it adds their own individuality to their kit, rather than having another money making arm of the corporate Premier League beast thrust upon them in the form of their own numbers and letters. UEFA even tried that trick and even though their font set is still used by a handful of teams, clubs have put whatever they want on shirts. Well except stripes on the back, but that’s another stupid regulation best kept to another forum for discussion.
I’ve noticed Premier League teams have started using their own fonts in domestic cups as well. Liverpool did in the 2010/11 season, but not last season, whereas Chelsea wore their 80’s style 3D block fonts in the FA Cup, and Man City wore a generic Umbro font today.
Talking of today’s match I could tell the two teams apart without any problems. The shade of sky blue on Man City’s new home shirts is darker than previous seasons, but it wouldn’t surprise me if they wore the away kit against teams who wear white. The third shirt has been leaked and will be dark grey (of a blue-ish hue) and black stripes, with the logos rendered in sky blue.
There’s a Uefa font set, Jon? Which teams have worn that? Sounds interesting. Wasn’t aware one existed.
I’m totally in favour of clubs having their own fonts like in European competition and in La Liga but it annoys me when they’re not made up to suit a specific kit (set), from a design and marketing point of view.
Birmingham (Xtep) used the same one as Arsenal (Nike) in the Europa League last season, so I thought it must have been the standard UEFA one. Although there isn’t a UEFA logo on it, which is a little odd.
Apparently its been confirmed that Arsenal have retained last season’s away strip as the third kit for the new season. Which puts it right up there with Liverpool’s “nightshade” kit as being one of the most superfluous!
You’re spot on Eric – as others have mentioned Nike have offered some poor kits and designs for a few years now (and not just for Arsenal). Hopefully the Arsenal return to Adidas rumour turns out to be correct…..
Bit O/T, watching England/Italy…
Italy in Blue/White/blue
England in White/Red/white (Although the red shorts dont look as dark as i remember..)
GK in the foul turquoise shirt/shorts with white socks
Would it not have been better for the GK to wear the red shirt with the black shorts from the 3rd GK kit????
In reference to Jon’s comment (162) regarding Arsenal retaining last season’s away shirt as this year’s third and Denis asking if the info came from HFK, interesting to see that HFK have changed the 3rd shirt to the yellow used over the last two years.
Matt, the England Home change shorts are a slightly lighter red than the goalkeeper shorts.
I’m not sure which black GK shorts you’re referring to. As I understand it, England currently have three goalkeeper kits: the all red, The purple and lime green and the turquoise (with white socks).
I thought the Italy shirt (and goalkeeper kit) was great, though I thought more of Schillaci and Zenga than Tardelli and Zoff.
Given that the differences are negligible, I don’t know why Italy didn’t just have that as their normal kit for 2012-14. Disappointed with the GK kit I must say, it should have been silver rather than grey, and needed black shorts and blue socks to finish it off.
I think the subtle changes made to the Italy shirt make it look more retro and way classier. Saying that I agree they should have used this kit in the Euros. This is obviously mainly a marketing ploy by Puma to sell more shirts.
Surprised that Arsenal have opted to retain a kit for a third season, rather than market a new third strip for extra coin, now that is a shock.
Also surprised Stoke and Swansea haven’t got third kits when they’ll need them. Perhaps the same apply to Sunderland and West Brom too. Spurs’ third strip is a waste of time, I forsee a clash incident at West Brom for sure.
To be fair the Premier League haven’t made the kit images themselves, they are provided by the clubs, who in turn had the images provided by their respective kit manufacturers.
Denis, I think it’s actually luck rather than judgement that made the one-off Italy kit superior to the actual design. Less is more and all that. 1982 of them were available so it’s there if you want it…
This has surely already been discussed at length but the reason why the GK socks weren’t blue was that they would clash with the outfield players. But what’s the difference between a goalkeeper and an outfield teammate from the waist down anyway? Do we need to differentiate? Surely the major factor is the top, in particular the sleeves. Do we know why the change was brought about?
And you’d think the rule could have been relaxed slightly for a friendly too.
Jon, I know that the makers provide the images but they’re not even consistent themselves, see Arsenal (I know that the yellow was from 2010). PL should have a template drawn and all clubs should fill it in, so to speak
Spurs’ lack of a viable third kit shown up on the first day, wearing navy-white-white against Newcastle. If Newcastle had a black back rather than white then all-white would have been fine for Spurs
Whilst I agree that Tottenham should have had something like yellow as a third colour, just looking at some pictures from the match, I don’t think there was really a problem.
We never seem to agree on anything, do we Denis? 😛
By the way, does anybody have a picture of the Tottenham third kit? I haven’t seen it and can’t seem to find a picture of it on Google…
Another spotter’s badge is for the socks that Wigan are wearing right now – white with blue turnovers.
However in the club shop, Premier League handbook and on last season’s final home match, Wigan had blue socks with navy turnovers, with no “WAFC” inscription on them. Not the first time they’ve had some sock inconsistency since getting supplied by Mi-Fit, that’s for sure.
As for Spurs’ third kit, I found another leak here
If the shirt was just grey, then fair enough, but the black stripes make it superfluous, and will cause an issue at West Brom for certain. I’m sure had Blackburn stayed up, this shirt would have possibly clashed with theirs too in the eyes of some officials.
Also agree with Denis on the differentiation thing with Čech’s kit, bit hard to see in dull light, perhaps he’d have been better off wearing the “slime yellow” strip that Chelsea have retained for a third season.
Still, better than his choice of kit the last time Chelsea played at Wigan on the opening day – charcoal grey, while his team mates wore black (one that the ref missed!).
Talking of refs, what about yesterday’s incident with Chris Foy (not to be confused with the Olympic cycling hero) being a right pedant about the colour of TAPE on James McClean’s socks. That is ridiculous!
Howard Webb has joined in by ordering David Silva to do likewise after he had white tape on his socks, which then got covered up with light blue tape. For the ultra pedants out there, the shade of blue wasn’t the same. Also, Joe Hart is wearing white tape by the looks of it over his green socks, but hasn’t been ordered off. Suppose its one rule for goalkeepers………
A truly ridiculous “directive” from FIFA, probably from the same guy who wanted to outlaw striped shirts just so the number could be “more visible”.
It reminds me of the time when FIFA tried to outlaw untucked shirts in the 1990 World Cup, telling referees to issue bookings for such misdemeanours. Thankfully common sense prevailed.
To be fair, a lot of players were using so much of the white tape, that it looked like they were wearing white socks. Which can cause a problem if the opposition are actually wearing white socks.
Instead of calling FIFA and the Officials pedants why not query the prima donna’s who insist on wearing white ankle socks tO show off, can’t think of any other reason why they’d wear them.
Just looked at the Premier Lge Handbook, Fulham’s third kit will be all Black with a White/Gold sash. Newcastle’s third kit is Lime green shirts and Navy shorts. Arsenal are supposedly keepeing the Yellow/Claret 2010/11 away kit for a further year as a third strip.
By the way, did anybody else find it odd that Portsmouth didn’t have the Jobsite branding on their shirts for the Capital One Cup match against Plymouth.
But it was back for the first league game of the season against Bournemouth a few days later.
Well I would say that it’s because they’ve decided to have separate deals for the cup competition and the league and have yet to sort the former, but it would imply financial nous.
RE Pompey. Glad to see us on a post relating to Prem 🙂
Firstly, All kits will be changing. Someone said above we would carry over, we arent.
Also we had no sponsor on our shirts for Plymouth as we had no sponsor at all at that point! Jobsite contract ran out at the end of last season. All preseason friendlies used kits from 10/11 seaon that had Jobsite already on them. Jobsite resigned as sponsor a day or 2 after the Plymouth game, days or so before the first league game.
New away shirt was used tonight v Colchester. Its an interesting orange affair.
After the first weekend of Premiership action, I can now form a more complete opinion…Arsenal home is best Nike kit by far – navy trim is really classy; Villa/West Ham are both like mid 90’s Pony kits – very old fashioned; Fulham home I like – but not sure the pinstripes really work; Chelsea black and yellow third I still think is gorgeous, as is Swansea away; Spurs I wasn’t sure about until you see it in the flesh – the silver grey trim does work, but it should have navy home shorts; West Brom/Sunderland/Stoke nice but a bit ‘templatey’; Newcastle home I think would have worked better with reversed colours – too much white on the shirt; Liverpool still HIDEOUS – nothing works for me on that home shirt at all; Norwich like West Ham/Villa looks a bit dated – last seasons was nicer; Man City home would be more balanced if it had black on the shorts, but why not use navy as a second colour?; Man Utd is an experiment too far – gingham is a pattern, like burbery, plaid etc, that should NEVER be used on football kits; Everton is nice but the ‘armbands’ just look naff; Southampton is not bad but not traditional enough for me; Reading home is really nice – love the red shoulder flash; QPR quite classy but can they start using the old ‘initials’ club crest again please? Think thats it, apologies if I’ve missed anyone!
The United ‘gingham’ shirt looked like a tabletop from a backstreet cafe on monday,the sweat gave it a sheen that looked plastic and shiny!! Whats the purpose of those ‘T’s on the shoulder too?
Anyone watching Malaga-Panathinaikos? Pana keeper is wearing a greenish-grey shirt and the outfielders are in the usual dark green, very hard to tell apart from a distance.
The Panathinikos GK choice is a shocker, very bad clash when at a glance, also would have thought Malaga would have been worthy of a bespoke kit from Nike
Martin Ping I have to vehemently disagree with you about the Liverpool home shirt, in my view it isn’t just the best kit in the Prem this season, but the best for years. They could only have bettered it with a white V neck (I suspect that tweak to appear next time they change the kit). As for the Navy bands on the Arsenal kit, I think they are naff and pointless. About the only thing I agree with you is that Tottenham should have Navy shorts (white for Europe)
Recently I bought the book Football Manager Stole My Life and, rather predictably, it resulted in my downloading the 2012 version, so my hours are going to be taken up with it.
The data editor had some kit options though, with the possibility of including change shorts and socks, as well as making changes for different competitions!
Andrew,
My biggest objection to the Liverpool shirt is with just a little more thought it could have been so much more – the material looks like a polo shirt, the ribbing likewise, and despite intending to evoke their 70’s/80’s heyday, the yellow logos just make the whole thing look unbalanced and cheap. But this is the whole point of a football strip forum – we aren’t all going to like the same thing! Just my opinion, no offence meant. Warrior I think have just come up with three strips without too much thought…should have been plain red shirt with white V-neck, white sponsors logo but other logo’s in yellow (a la early 80’s Umbro), plain red shorts and socks with single white stripe down the side of the shorts, with the away a simple white/black/white combo and the third all yellow..I’m sure LFC fans would have preferred that?
Well I was right about Liverpool’s kits causing a problem tonight. Hearts are wearing white at home, with Liverpool in black, which is apparently registered as their third strip in European competition.
Martyn I agree with almost all of your assessments, especially that of the new Liverpool home shirt – like City’s away shirt of last season, having the sponsor trim in yellow/gold really distorts the balance of the shirt – both kits I feel would be better with white sponsors to offset the colour of the manufacturer’s logo. And as you say, the Liverpool shirt would look much better with a white v-neck.
Massive fan of the new Arsenal home kit – was a huge fan of the previous two, but this is great too. Love the navy trim – reminds of the 90s, and looks so smart on the collar.
My only qualm is as with those kits mentioned – why not red socks? When are Arsenal going to return to red, for the most part of their history the most traditional colour? The 10-11 and 11-12 kits looked, so, so much better when worn with red. Oh well.
Still, Gunners fans can be happy that this strip will have a two-year lifespan – if only all clubs adopted this policy. We can but dream.
Arsenal home shirt has really grown on me. Hated it at first.
Aston villas home shirt has too much going on with the collar and the shors look naf.
Chelseas home and away are pretty good if nothing special. Third is horrendous.
Evertons home just doesnt look right with the armbands. Overall it is a cheap looking shirt.
Fulham kappa kits re meh.
Liverpools home kit s not bad but agree with the comments that there is too much yellow on it.
Man ctys kits are class. Best of the bunch in my opinion.
Man Utd . Big fan of the home kit, in the minority I know . Away kit looks great too but heads up I picked it up without tryin it on and the collar feels reallyuncomfortable
Spurs kits look pretty good but would have to say after seeing them i person they look really cheap.
Not much to say about all the generic adidas kits. Very uninspired and lazy.
And other crap looking Puma Newcastle shirt. They havte y et to make a decent looking shirt for them when compared to the Italyand African nations cup kits.
Re Barca v. Real Madrid. Barca always had really nice classy looking tradititional shirts until the last three or four. It now seems to be a case of what can we do next instead of traditional stripes to make them look as tacky as possible. The new Real Madrid shirt on the other hand is plain yet different to previous offerings. Having said that I always preferred Madrid kits with purple trim as was the case in the Hummel and Kelme kit days.
Mark,
I don’t know what has gone on with Barca/Nike either – nothing wrong with tweaking the width of the stripes slightly, or adding a third colour (navy or yellow are the most common), but last seasons was horrible, and just didn’t say ‘Barca’ to me, and this seasons is an experiment too far – like TV interference!
I like the Real kit – navy as trim with subtle hints of sky blue works well – but purple would make a nice change.
Have you seen the new Bundesliga kits? Some interesting kits there – as a fan of FC Bayern I love our new away shirt – wasn’t sure about the flourescent orange/red trim at first but it looks really fresh and they’ve used it loads in pre season.
Martyn, the Black/Grey third kit is the pick of the bunch for me in this years Bayern wardrobe. Having had a quick look at other Bundesliga offerings i’m really impressed by Hannover’s offerings especially the third kit.
Pretty sure Nike used to make referees kits but didn’t put the Swoosh on them because dour authority doesn’t really fit in with their all action marketing angle. So it could be one of theirs.
This season they are putting the Swoosh on (France, Holland…) but they’re doing the tonal thing where it’s the same colour as the shirt.
To sum up, I’m pretty sure Rennie’s wearing a Nike shirt in that pic.
Mark (228),
In Germany you usually get really interesting offerings from smaller companies, plus the larger ones use templates that you don’t see in England. For example, a couple of years ago adidas used a template for 1.FC Nurnberg and Carl Zeiss Jena that had asymetric sleeve colours – the former’s away kit was white with one red and one black sleeve, the latters home was white with yellow and blue. As you say, Hannover have had some interesting kits, and this season is no exception. Going back to FCB, the third shirt is different because of the orange and silver trim – Liverpool fans have pointed out the similarity to adidas’ last away shirt for them, but that was trimmed with grey – ours is a real silver shade. Interesting that the only English team that adidas experiment on with trim seems to be Chelsea. Biggest UK contract I suppose – but they do seem to try different things there.
229-232:
Don’t think I’ve seen that ref kit before – My theory is that it is from a pre season tournament – judging by the sleeve logos maybe the Emirates Cup? You do sometimes get different ref kits for those, but they’re still done under the auspices of the EPL, hence the logo…bit of a mystery is why the manufacturers logo is not visible/covered up? template looks like a Nike one (like the TC ones used on the top bar of this home page), but as you say, is probably a ‘kick racism out’ logo on the chest. Another mystery is where Uriah’s breast pocket is?
“MIDDLESBROUGH, UNITED KINGDOM – NOVEMBER 20: Referee Uriah Rennie in action during the Barclays Premiership match between Middlesbrough and Fulham on November 20, 2005 at The Riverside Stadium in Middlesbrough, England. (Photo by Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images)”
If you search for Uriah Rennie on Getty Images, you’ll see lots more picture of Rennie wearing different referee kits, with that logo.
Eric, the kit Uriah Rennie is wearing is an official sports kit, they had the contract for the premier league and football league after nike and before umbro. They have ceased trading in the UK but still provide most of the refs kits in the US (although not MLS as they have adidas). The nike ref kit had two narrow white lines going doen the sleeves on the black kit, the lines were black on the coloured kit.
Denis,
Granted, the trim colour on the new Bayern away isn’t traditional ‘Bayern’ red – adidas call it ‘infrared’, and the overall effect in the flesh is a bright orangey red – the problem here is that unlike the strips referred to in your article, Bayern are (unusually for one of Europes big clubs these days) alternating the issuing of new shirts, so they are using last season’s red and gold home this year. Plus, I can’t think of an instant of Bayern using change shorts with the home kit – they have the same level of integrity as Liverpool and Arsenal when it comes to that. I would imagine that if we are playing a red shirt/white short team adidas will either come up with a bespoke change pair for the away, or we’ll use the third…Where I am going with this is that I would think adidas are thinking of making the red in the home shirt a much brighter hue next season. Our nickname is ‘Die Roten’, but there is no hard or fast rule as to the shade of red – up until the mid 60’s it was almost claret, so we’ve come full circle! Still love it though, traditional or not!
Oh I know that Martyn, and as I say it’s a nice kit, I’d just prefer if the shade of red matched. Were change shorts/socks used on the 03-04 home kit, the Arsenal-style one (I realise they were not the away versions)?
Denis,
Don’t think so on that one, but the one that followed it (retro styled with no adidas trim whatsoever in its first year) had white shorts & socks so neccesitated a red change pair – in its second year adidas changed it to all red. I don’t think when they have red shorts they have ever used a change pair. Socks are a different matter – the hooped style home kit that followed the above had white socks with red trim and a reverse as backup, and the striped ‘110th anniversary’ shirt from a couple of years ago was worn with navy or red in its lifetime. Being a Bayern fan, and a fan of football kit design, we have a very complicated history when it comes to strips, with some one off combinations that would no doubt cause Jon some headaches if he did do a European TC!
Did anyone see the highlights of Wycombe v Bristol Rovers? Both team were in home kits. Wycombe Sky Blue and Navy halves and Rovers in Royal and white quarters. I know Bristol R have a black away kit which was more of a clash but I’m sure normally the do not play each other in home kits.
To be honest Alexander I think the green/black would be more of a clash contrast wise. I foresee another issue in the reverse fixture as Wycombe’s away strip is all white. Agian not a terrible clash but I suspect other clubs will change from white against Rovers.
Denis – I know – so strange when teams (the kitman?) do that.
Does anyone else find it ridiculous that Aston Villa’s socks are quite obviously a darker shade of sky blue than the sleeves on the shirt? Seem to recall similar last season when West Ham paired their away shorts and socks with the home shirt.
Very slack, Nick. Back in the late 90s, O’Neills, who manufacture most of the teams’ kits in Gaelic football and hurling, made the sleeves from a different material to the rest of the jersey, look at this for example: http://www.sportsfile.com/id/022389/
I remember those jerseys very well Denis, I used to wear a Cavan jersey around North London (the only blue shirt you’ll see me in) and the body material fading after many washes but the sleeves keeping it’s colour, didn’t look great.
My own thought at the time Denis was that on the body of the shirt, the badge, sponsor and the GAA logo were all on the (cotton) shirt in felt. These were the first jersey’s O’Neills were producing with county crests etc on the sleeve as part of the colour of the sleeve (is this making sense?) I’m no expert in things ‘textile’ but perhaps they didn’t have expertise to do this in cotton and had to use that awful material instead.
Something else I’ve noticed this evening. Fraser Forster in goal for Celtic is in all black and so are the officials – bear in mind you have the ones now placed to the side of the goal (who do nothing..) and that seems more than odd that it’s allowed.
You’ll find officials in the premier league do not allow it, actually I think kitmen in the prem sort it out in advance so the officials know what shirt to bring.
I believe that in current academy football, if the home team is wearing any black kit (Player or GK) they must supply a kit for the referee.. if not (and the away team are) they the away team should fetch a referee kit… strange isnt it!
The Umbro Diamond kit, available from A&H International, comes in 4 colours – Black, Green (Jade), Red & Yellow. So when Liverpool play Norwich at Anfield there may be a clash with the ref in Reina wears Green and Ruddy wears Black.
Some odd clashes in the Championship this weekend. The ref at Millwall wore black which in my view clashed with the home teams Navy (he could have worn yellow as neither keeper did) and Bolton’s Adam Bogdan wore Orange GK kit away at Hull. Surely that’s not on?
Yeah, Andrew, that’s another problem with Warrior in that we’re only aware of two goalkeeper kits as things stand. With other manufacturers you’re confident they’ve got another just in case. With Warrior, less so.
When I said “I remember them having a red goalkeeper kit in 2007 aswell” – I meant to type “I remember them having an orange goalkeeper kit in 2007 aswell”
That one in 06-07 was more old gold in my view, zero clash. David Seaman had orange in 96-97, 97-98 and 98-99 too and there didnt appear to be any confusion.
Even if it is gold, to be honest, and I know I’m probably the only one, but I have never liked teams wearing red against Wolves either – but that has always been accepted within the game.
Although, maybe I have a friend in Alex Ferguson, from that game at Molinuex a couple of years ago!
Arsenal wore navy at Wolves in 09, but I don’t see any clash there – I would against Blackpool but I think the two clubs (Blackpool and Wolves) have very different colours
Re. GK kits – here’s one for everyone: Bayern’s home GK shirt is lime green and black (contrasting with the red home), but the away GK is red…now surely if Bayern are wearing their away shirt, then they would be playing a team in red, meaning that the GK shirt would clash with the opposition? They couldn’t wear it with the home shirt, meaning that it’s only use would be for European games where they might be wearing the third shirt when they don’t clash with the opposition (ie. last year they wore the black third away at Napoli).
I know that David Seaman wore red against Blackburn in 1992-93 when Arsenal wore their away, but I can’t think of too many other examples of a goalkeeper wearing his club’s home colour, bar of course when French ones do it in the Champions League
Yes, it is a bit strange. adidas are marketing it as a ‘Limited Edition’, and it is a near replica of the club’s home kit from the 70’s – red with chunky white collar and cuffs…but a very strange choice nonetheless.
Oliver Kahn used to wear red (with blue) gk kits back when he was in his prime didn’t he? Sure the reverse of the one he wore in the CL Final shootout win over Valencia was red.
It’d be good to see a picture of the one you’re referring to, Martyn/Denis.
Yes, as previously stated, Bayern had a navy home kit when Olly Kahn wore the red GK strip – the away during that period was either white with red stripes and navy trim or a horizontal twist on the same theme, and the third was the grey and red design as worn when we were robbed of the European cup in ’99, so a red GK kit wouldn’t really clash with any of those.
There is a data editor Eric which allows complete editing of kits, loads of styles available and the option for alternative shorts/socks and different kits for different competitions.
Just wish I’d explored it more before starting my game with Cork City!
regarding goalkeeper kits i am sure i have seen Buffon of Juve wearing the home kit as a keeper shirt. i think Juve had a salmon pink away kit which they were wearing at the time(early 2000’s) and whoever Juve were playing he was wearing that.
Is the Portsmouth away kit, the same black with blue one that they had last season?
I can’t tell from the picture on Wikipedia, and they aren’t selling any of the new kits in the Portsmouth online store.
They released a new orange third kit for the new season, which they have used. Just seems odd that the black kit is still the away, if it is the same one as last season.
Bit strange seeing as their home kit is blue/white stripes and blue shorts/socks (albeit royal blue)… Surely they’d not be allowed to wear that if their home kit clashed (Or is Royal/Navy not a clash?)
Royal blue against navy blue is generally considered a clash. Last season, any team who played in royal blue and went to the Den to play Millwall (who wear navy blue) – wore a change kit.
Eric, actually I just remembered that in 1992-93, when PL refs began wearing green, goalkeepers were forced to change, with the exception of Peter Schmeichel for some reason
Bit Lazy of Warrior not to give Liverpool grey away change socks, isn’t it? I know that there is red on the shirts, but red socks still look out of place.
Agree with that Denis.The red socks dont suit them at all against a team like sunderland.Stranger still I find is that Sunderland are wearing Black shorts/socks which would be better on Liverpool.
Ciaran, Denis, I was thinking about that myself. Sunderland were wearing their first choice kit and I have no problem with Liverpool wearing black shorts but the socks are an odd one (gr?).
Firstly, as you say, it’s technically not necessarily mismatching as the red and gold/yellow are used throughout – though this season’s kits are obviously not designed to be interchangeable – and I probably would have ended up loving it if the game had been won convincingly and memorably by Liverpool. However, the fact is it’s more evidence that Warrior have treated Liverpool’s kits with a lack of care and forethought.
I think you’re best going with a solid shirt v a striped shirt, and the white shorts when there’s so much white on the Sunderland shirt isn’t great either. Not necessarily a clash but just not better than black shirt and shorts. It may seem contradictory but for me the solid colour of black against red/white-black is easier to distinguish.
Sorry, I’m talking out of my a*se aren’t I? The Liverpool Third has nightshade shorts, right? I imagined the white ones. But I stand by opinion regarding the shirt – the black works better.
Fellaini just had a goal disallowed even though a defender’s trailing leg was playing him on. The exact reason why teams have to have different-coloured socks, but not caught.
Manchester United always change socks when away to a team with blue socks, is black and black enough of a contrast in such a situation?
I don’t want to be pedantic, but isn’t the reason why teams have different colour socks because it is football, and often players are looking down at the ball on the floor at a players feet?
As for Man United, they aren’t changing socks because the opposition are wearing blue socks. They are doing it for the Ferguson fetish! As I’m sure you know, Denis.
It’s just that it’s only more obvious when playing teams in blue, as not many teams have red socks, but not a red shirt (which means Man United have to wear a change kit anyway) and obviously they can’t switch to white, if the opposition are wearing white socks, like many teams do. And not many teams wear black socks. And if they do, they usually have a red shirt.
Why haven’t Arsenal opted for red socks as their first choice in recent years? Each of the last five strips has looked so much better for having them, particularly the 10-11 home strip.
Hopefully they’ll return to this tradition in two years with the next home strip.
Last season the official home socks were red, but were only used away from home in the event of a clash.
Also, interesting to see Malaga wearing their away kit at to Zenit (who turned up in all light-blue) last night. You don’t see many kit mix ups in the Champions League normally.
In April Spurs play at Stamford Bridge, as normal they will switch to navy socks to avaoid a clash but my question is will they change shorts too? Usually they wear Navy but this years kit has white shorts. In my opinion I hate the white shirts, white shorts and dark socks look, it looks unbalanced. Anyone else care?
They’ve often wore white-white-navy at the Bridge though haven’t they? Even though I think Jon said Chelsea haven’t wore blue on white since about 1987
Interesting to see the match officials wearing different kits in the Champions League and in the Europa League this season. Adidas usually just give out one set, don’t they?
Like the one’s used in La Liga and the SPL are usually the same for Europe.
The Champions League kits are nice, but the Europa League kits are… wacky.
And on Spurs’ strips: for those who’ve seen them in the flesh, do you agree with me in saying that they look cheap? I’m not a big fan of all the unnecessary design flourishes on the away in particular, very dated.
Spurs trim: Silver – looks better in the flesh than on TV. Despite the third being superfluous, it’s really nice – yellow trim at least HINTS at classic Spurs kits of old. Really like Fulham’s away, unusual colour choice for them, but it works, and their third, which I saw for the first time here, is stunning (though I’m not sure where the green comes from). Best Man City kit is the third – when it was unveiled I thought ‘oh great, trying too hard again’, but I like it. Best Prem sets IMO still Chelsea and Swansea (if you count last season’s SCFC black effort being this seasons third). And I’m sorry, I still think that Liverpool’s three are the WORST combination of strips in the history of the Premiership…
I would just like to apologise to Andrew, and to a lesser extent Denis, for the the whole “match officials wearing the same colour as goalkeepers in the Premier League” thing.
I was wrong. I’ve kept a close eye on it the past few weeks, and I got it wrong.
I’m mainly apologising for calling Andrew’s comment “nonsense”. Sorry Andrew.
Sorry to go off subject (and return to my pet subject) but Bayern Munchen were away at Werder Bremen today and unveiled a dedicated pair of change shorts to go with the away shirt (yes I know that red doesn’t strictly speaking clash with green but they ARE both dark-ish strips neccessitating the change)…They are flourescent orange/red (matching the trim on the shirt) – looks classy when you see the whole outfit, and should please the contributors to this site who complain about teams wearing the same coloured shorts. ALSO – Haven’t seen the highlights yet but I would guess that Neuer had the all red GK strip on (much lighter shade than the outfield red meaning no clash).
Yeah, love those Bayern Away change shorts. On the same subject, Swansea wore black (with gold) change shorts and socks but, whilst being very nice, didn’t quite avoid an overall clash with Stoke, in my opinion.
No Worries Eric. Clash of the day for me was at Bramall Lane. Notts County in Pink against Sheffield Utd just does not offer any contrast. Surely their Gold/Orange and Navy hoops would have been better?
They could have offered a bit more variation. I mean, God knows what an Adidas team who play in blue are supposed to do when they face a team like Wolves.
The Liverpool 3rd kit seems to look a lot darker on the field. I was listening to the Norwich game on the radio and they described the Liverpool kit as black. Then on Match of the Day they had black as Liverpool’s colour when they were going through the starting line-ups. So, in effect,Liverpool have two black kits this season!
Had the same conversation last night whilst enjoying several pints with the Arsenal Tralee Supporters lads who were in town for yesterdays game. As far as I can see both shirts clash with West Ham, as you know we’ve worn red at Upton (and Villa) Park before and it looked wrong. Common sense says wear the yellow but common sense didn’t prevail at Blackpool the season before last….
In person the Liverpool Third does look like a dark navy. It would be good to see the Arsenal “Third” for a third season. But will they revert back to the crest from 2010-11 or keep the one from last season? I have the feeling it’ll be the latter as all the original stock will be gone.
Well good for Arsenal/Nike if that’s the case. I now, however, have a feeling that the 2011-12 handbook had the Third kit crest as it was in ’10-11 too. You able to check that?
I don’t think there will be a problem with Arsenal wearing the new away kit at Upton Park.
By the way, Iker Cassillas wore the green outfield third kit against Deportivo tonight. Iker has worn outfield kits in the past, in the event of a clash. But tonight there was no reason why he didn’t just wear the bright pink, or black goalkeeper kit.
Claret v black is not often allowed, for example in 2007-08 Manchester United wore the previous season’s white away when they went to Villa Park while Liverpool did the same in 2002-03.
Both Arsenal and Manchester City wore navy at Villa Park last season and both instances caused confusion
Only missing Tottenham’s third and a couple of last season’s away strips that this year are used as third strips! (Arsenal 3rd, Man Utd, Reading, Southampton)
Only just seeing highlights of Villa v West Brom for first time – both in white shorts and sky blue socks against white, which Arsenal considered enough of a clash to change from last week.
That was fun viewing! So many times I wanted to hurl my iPhone out of the window though, and also several moments that demonstrated surprising astuteness.
The manufacturer that Pat Nevin refers to, in case you haven’t worked it out, is Xara.
Full of errors, that clip, but entertaining all the same.
It was mentioned on this site that Manchester United would never wear all-red when shorts clashed due to the all-red connection with a certain team from Merseyside. Now, I’m not the youngest bloke to contribute to this site but I cannot remember the last time I saw them in all-white. Very similar to their old buddies from Yorkshire, nice of them……
Agreed with that 100% Jay. But after having a close-up look at the shirt in the club shop before the game tonight I can really see a Ref not allowing it to be worn at the weekend.
I wonder what Bordeaux will wear tonight at Newcastle?
Or rather, what will Newcastle wear? I have a feeling they’ll be wearing the glow-in-the-dark lime green kit at home again, just as they did at home to Atromitos in the last round.
Bordeaux are a bit like Liverpool and a few others in that their third kit is entirely superfluous. Navy home kit, white away kit, and what appears to be a more purpley shade of navy for a third kit, complete with white Vee, and a PINK sash! Looks more like a Miss World pageant outfit!
1. Characterized by nobility; majestic.
2.
a. Of high spiritual, moral, or intellectual worth.
b. Not to be excelled; supreme.
3. Inspiring awe; impressive.
4. French for wierd!
One final word on West Ham v Arsenal before I’m no doubt proven wrong: in 2009-10 Arsenal wore their white third rather than the navy away, which would have clashed less than the current one would
Yeah, reckon you’re bang on with the shorts. I think they may have had to manufacture new old shirts as I doubt the stock would’ve been kept until now (as I have a pretty good idea where it goes) but last season’s shorts – Home, Away or Third change – didn’t have the laurel and oak leaves so work ok. A hybrid kit, whatever next…
Didn’t watch the game but thinking…borderline overall clash? Arsenal didn’t wear those shorts all of last season but chose to wear them on a day they matched their opponents’ shirts? Should have worn the yellows I reckon.
I thought that the claret shorts were first choice when it was unveiled? didn’t Arsenal wear the clarets until they went to Anfield? In a related note, Arsenal/Nike have changed the crest/sponsor to keep a kits lifespan going before (the unveiling of the new crest overlapped, as did changing from Sega to 02). Don’t think any problems were caused by the shorts though – without wishing to open a can of worms AGAIN, but Spurs rarely changed their shorts (when navy was first choice) when they played Everton. Surely the issue of shorts clashing with opposing shirts is irrelevant? Especially when a vivid yellow shirt (like Arsenal’s) is used. I know there are some exceptions, but I really don’t think its an issue (sorry). Moving on, Hoffenheim (all blue) played Bayern (all red) yesterday, yet turned up in their black away strip…confused?
The redcurrant are first choice Martyn, though Anfield was the first game of the 2010-11 season.
I don’t think it’s a problem in all cases about shorts clashing with opposition shirts, but I think that there can be issues with peripheral vision. In the comments on my article, John linked to a college study on this, with interesting results.
There was a lot of objection when Blackpool got Wonga as sponsor, maybe we never heard much about it given their lower profile compared to Newcastle. Having said that I think a lot of the objection to Wonga is down to people not understanding the market place in which they are operating. The ridicoulously high interest rates quoted by them are based on borrowing a loan over a minimum of 12 months (APR). This is the figure they are required to quote by law however loans offered by companies like Wonga are intended to be very short term.
Eric and Denis, of course the referee should be in black.
The referee should always be in black! Unless its a game involving the Scottish national side.
Eric,
I believe that the official line is that they still have to name 23 players, given 1-23, but only 18 actually in the squad. But as you say, a lot of national teams persist with the numbers from the previous tournament. As a fan of German football, I know Germany do.
It’s an interesting one. Discussed the number 10 missing for Ireland against Germany with Denis yesterday. Both theories above could well apply, Denis would have to confirm (because I can’t be bothered). The thinking would be a Euro 2012 squad picked based around what the expected starting lineup would be, then for the next games the players from the Euros keep their numbers with those missing again being replaced based on expected starting lineup and, with Robbie Keane out, that resulted in the ten not appearing.
Denis is right Jay, I was making a joke about the performance as it was, well, a joke I suppose! Didn’t see HIGNFY myself but turned to Sky 1 to watch ‘Moone Boy’ and very good it was too! By the way noticed that we have another new kit. It’s ok but I’d love to see us go back to the circa 1978 O’Neills number.
Yeah, the joke wasn’t too subtle, Ronan, it was me being an idiot. Moone Boy was a good choice, as it’s set bang in between Euro ’88 and Italia ’90 isn’t it? A happier time for Irish football. Think he wears a Crown Paints Liverpool shirt (’87-88) in one episode, or certainly in publicity shots.
I’ve checked it and I’m sure it’s a reproduction. I don’t think adidas Originals ever did that one so it’s probably Score Draw or something. The sponsor’s too big – not to mention in too good condition – for it to be an adidas replica from the time.
Think you’re spot on with the Liverpool shirt Jay. Plenty of Liverpool fans around in Ireland back then (and of course a fair few today). Also correct to say that it was a better time for Irish football – they were wearing the Adidas shirt with the ‘mesh’ sleeve if I recall correctly. Met a bloke once wearing the away one that he said once belonged to Niall Quinn – it was about 8 sizes too big for him so he could have been telling the truth….
That would be a fair point, Denis, if I’d actually advocated using an original shirt rather than a reproduction. I don’t think it would have been a good idea, and I’ll tell you for why: if I saw a show had gone to the length of sourcing an original shirt I would have been in such awe that I might have missed some lines of dialogue.
Actually, I’ve seen a few of those shirts in mint condition – the kids’ ones aren’t that rare.
On that same theme, there’s a new Gerard Butler film – Playing For Keeps – where he plays an ex-Celtic and Liverpool player and there’s flashback footage of him wearing an ’89-91 Celtic Home shirt. It’s a sourced original but there’s a problem: it’s a replica so the sponsor’s far too small.
Yeah, Denis and I were discussing how bad that one was just the other day. I saw someone at training with that on once and wasn’t even immediately sure of what it was trying to be.
Oh there must be method to the madness. It’s not difficult to replicate a kit. There must be some sort of benefit in the two being easily distinguishable, though what that is I have no idea.
Have heard the excuse that differentiation is required so that those with originals (as opposed to Originals) don’t lose out if they’re selling, but you could easily just put that on the tag
I don’t see why adidas would care about that, unless managers (designers twenty years ago?) have a stash of the originals ready to sell for their retirement. And the problem with just adding the label is that people will swap them. Some people buy old kids’ Umbro shirts for the diamond strip so they can make up men’s shirts to sell as original 70s/80s stuff, so I don’t think an exchanging of labels would be beyond them.
With England playing tonight, I was thinking about the upcoming switch from Umbro to Nike.
It’s obviously been a long time since England changed kit manufacturer, so I was just wondering about what they are going to do.
Do you think they will release a new home and away kit at the same time, and just release new kits every two years at the same time? Or will they go back to staggering the release dates, which will lead to a kit only lasting one year?
What do the good folk of this website think they will do?
What are the shorts? They’re not the outfield Away change because they have a full colour crest, if memory serves me correctly. My initial thought was that they were the “Galaxy” training shorts.
Eric, the precedent that springs to mind regarding the England kits would be France. Nike took over the FFF contract in 2011, I think, immediately released two beautiful kits, then released two more beautiful kits for Euro 2012.
To sum up, England will have lots of beautiful kits.
What could the referee switch to anyway, to allow Hart to change?
They have four kits. Black, yellow, grey and light blue. Black would have clashed with England. Grey would have caused an issue with Poland. And the Poland keeper wore yellow.
Not that I have a problem with refs wearing the same colour as keepers.
Oh yeah, I know Denis. I was actually talking about Matt’s post.
I decided to leave the overall clash thing. I, unsurprisingly, had no issue with it, but the thought did occur to me during the game that you and Jay would bring it up! haha!
What was the order I said for precedence on changing? Home outfield, away outfield, away goalkeeper, officials, home goalkeeper? That would have worked today. Officials would have worn yellow and the home ‘keeper would have had to find another top. If only there was a website that could tell us what options he would have…
Didn’t Arsenal turn up with the same kit again the following season, and Man United decided to change to white socks. Which, I guess isn’t too much of a problem, as they like to do that.
Also, I noticed from one of @hullcitykits tweets, that the ill thought out Adidas goalkeeper kits are causing a problem. Something which I mentioned on here a few weeks ago…
@457 – The shorts are from the England 3rd Gk Kit (They have one that the Mens team have never used but the u21’s downwards and ladies have.. think we had a pic on here somewhere)
@466/468 Poland do have a Green GK shirt (That design is available in Green/Yellow/Red/Black/White/Purple) which of those colours they could have worn green (which they used at Euro 2012 I think..) and put the Referee in Yellow (and therefore Joe Hart in the Light blue/green effort..)
A little known fact regarding the Man U Arsenal cup game that season……now we all know that Arsenal will either wear all short sleeves or all long sleeves (never a mix) except for that game. What happened was all the Arsenal team wore long sleeves in the first half but changed at half-time to short sleeves (haven’t got a clue why). Thierry Henry came on as a second-half sub but hadn’t changed his shirt at half time, so it’s the only time you’ll ever see a mix on the same pitch where Arsenal are concerned. Unless anyone out there knows different…….
We missed a trick when talking about which kit Arsenal would wear at Upton Park, and whether if it is the yellow third kit, if it will have the anniversary badge, or not. When they turned at Upton Park with the new/old crest, somebody should have said…
Matt (476), what shorts are those? The Home change gk kit, which I think you’re referring to, is purple (though it looks like navy) with apparently luminous lime green details. There’s no way those are the shorts. I’m sticking with them being the “galaxy” training shorts http://amzn.to/OQIo6c
There’s a whole load of colours for that Nike goalkeeper template but this site doesn’t give Poland the green version, certainly not in Euro 2012.
I think the biggest issue I had with the United-Stoke game was United wearing white shorts with dark socks and Stoke the reverse, but it still didn’t really cause a problem. The Stoke shirt is predominantly blue and the continuation of that to the shorts was easily distinguishable from United’s red with white shorts.
Certainly no issue with the Celtic game, though the St Murn players who went with a black baselayer could’ve helped out by wearing a white one (the shirt’s sleeves are striped). I thought I saw a guy wearing a white one in the first half but it might have just been my stream confusing me.
Oh, regarding Stoke (*takes deep breath*), I’ve thought about this long and hard and I reckon they had time to put together a green Third kit for the United game, in the wake of Alex Ferguson’s “jolly green giants” comments. It would, of course, have just been teamwear but they could have called the Premier League, got it cleared and printed up/had the crests affixed during the night.
It would’ve been a great response to the jibe and surely would have brought such a cheer from the fans that it would’ve acted as a shot in the arm. They might have then gone on to score first and… Oh.
I thought the Stoke away kit was a stupid idea when I first saw it, but yeah, after seeing it at Anfield and Old Trafford, there isn’t really a problem at all.
Is it an anniversary kit, or something? And, have they retained a third kit?
Hello all. Wow, I’ve just spent far too much time reading every comment! Great discussion, with some fantastic points to peruse over. If I may go all the way back to the comments around the 190ish mark about socks and tape, does anyone have any opinions on boot colours? Maybe it’s just me but it’s something that bugs me, especially when it comes to officials insisting players ‘colour in’ the tape/wear the correct colour tape around the ankle but every boot colour under the sun is fine. I don’t believe there are any guidelines regarding boot colour whereas there are for socks. Personally I’d like to see black boots for all, but I doubt that will ever return! Should the boots match the sock colour or should a team all wear the same colour? Should tape colour matter in this context?I’m just interested in peoples opinions on this as I haven’t seen it discussed elsewhere – possibly because I’m the only one bothered by it!
I’ve never had a problem with boots and colours, to be honest. I’ve seen it mentioned on here before. Personally, I think it’s kit geeks having a bit of an existential moment really. Ha!
I think for me it’s more about the lack of any decisions about the boots. I remember back in the 80’s when players started wearing cycling shorts under their shorts, now that didn’t bother me but was soon ‘regulated’ so that they had to match the shorts, the same as now with the long sleeved thingees they wear. Now of course we have the ankle tape having to be coloured in which I think is a bit silly if for example a player has red socks (v blue socks) and is wearing blue boots, wouldn’t the boots be more of a problem that a bit of white tape?
The ‘Arsenal to Adidas’ story seems to be gathering pace according to today’s ‘Daily Telegraph.’ anyone else heard anything? What about my fellow Gooner Denis??
Karris the issue isn’t strictly speaking tape, it’s the use of white ankle socks over coloured football socks that cause a clash with white stockinged teams. The tape generally isn’t used that excessively, though I suspect there were isolated incidents.
Usually, the ankle socks are not worn over the football socks – the foot of the football sock is cut off and then the rest of the football sock is taped on to the ankle sock.
The reason is that many players like to wear a particular kind of ankle sock with their boot.
But why can’t they wear them in a matching colour? It harks back to that Prima Dona Ponce Ronaldo wanting to show off and have his feet more visable. Tosser!
Agreed that the second kit would suffice but even so Denis I thought even a kit fanatic like yourself could appreciate that a newcomer like under armour needs to showcase its designs to a greater audience.
Your right about the home kit.was a gaa-heavy weekend so didnt see the game.Forgot the traditional design was gone from southampton (along with form too it seems!).was thinking back to the sunderland/bolton game last year which was a bad clash in my view.
Anyone see the London Irish-Harlequins game? No? You missed a cracker (probably. It caught my eye when I was watching the news – didn’t listen).
The reason I mention it is that if anyone still is of the opinion that the “overall clash” is just some fantastical idea that Denis Hurley has dreamt up (Eric) then watch this http://bit.ly/S8jmNf
On paper it’s light shirts and dark shorts against the reverse, but throw in number patches, side panels, several sponsors, collar designs and God knows what else and it becomes an unsightly mess and very unpleasant to watch – and not just because it’s rugby union!
Granted, it’s an extreme example, but football (whatever the code) looks better when a team wears as much as possible of their primary colour and as little as possible of anything else, and the opposition does the same.
Yeah, I remember that one. But I think the key difference is that the Scotland-Somewhat Blacks game, on paper, and if the shirts were accurately depicted, could have been a clash. That’s not necessarily the case with the London Irish-Harlequins one – especially if the submitted illustrations of the playing wear were devoid of added details, as is possible.
i don’t know if anyone else watched the football league show this weekend. both sheff wed and hull wore their 3rd/last seasons away kits at their respective away games. sheff wed in all silver/grey , hull in light blue and white.
Hull City wore their third kit as they were using the ‘tash converters’ sponsor. They had a batch of unprinted third kits and it would be easier than reprinting their black kits.
Haven’t seen any footage of the Sunderland – Middlesbrough game from last night but somebody mentioned to me today that ‘Boro wore their light blue away kit (no surprise there, of course) but their keeper was also decked out in light blue. Surely not!!
Yeah, both goalkeepers wearing the same colour (let alone kit!) is frowned upon these days. But I think most of the Adidas teams have only been given the orange and light blue goalkeeper kits, very few teams seem to have been given the ‘tan’ kit.
I think this is the case for both Sunderland and Middlesbrough. So it was either both wear the orange, which isn’t ideal, but doesn’t really cause a problem. Or, one of the teams wearing the light blue goalkeeper kit. Which obviously wouldn’t as Middlesbrough away kit is light blue.
I’m not sure why Adidas haven’t given everyone the tan goalkeeper kit, aswell. Only Bolton do, as far as I know. And Hull, after they asked for it.
Any chance there may have been a half-time change? Neither scenario is really acceptable so either could have been changed for a perceived lesser evil.
Arsenal kit man has had a shocker here. Surely they’d normally change the whole strip rather than compromise the integrity of a kit. Red socks with the purple kit looks awful.
Sorry, Matt, are you saying that a goalkeeper is allowed to clash with his opposite number on the proviso he won’t come up for a corner even if the side is losing late on? Surely a match-specific rule shouldn’t be implemented just because the referee hasn’t done his job properly beforehand?
Andrew, I disagree. Yes, there’s an issue with the navy on the socks not matching but that could be (has been) interpreted as black or purple. Otherwise the red and white links in reasonably well. It was the best option as the Away socks would have clashed and the Home first choice ones would have created an unideal white/dark vs dark/white below waist conflict (overall clash territory).
Personally I would have loved to see them wear their yellow socks but that’s just me…
Agreed about the ManU/Arsenal game. I feel in situations like this that Home team could help out a little. We all know Fergie likes the white socks; surely this would be solving the clash. At the end of the day any clash affects both teams and does it really matter who solves it! I’m obviously not insinuating that the home team should ever change their home strip fully; I’m just saying ManU could have made things easier by wearing white socks, it’s not exactly like it’s against their kit history (i.e. Liverpool). Got to agree that either team in White socks looks better than what we saw today.
As for the goalkeeper situation I feel that predominantly one teams Goalkeeper shirt should be different colour to everyone else on the pitch. What happened to the days when teams played in Red & Blue with GK’s in Green & Yellow with the Referee in Black!! Sadly I don’t feel this will happen any time soon! But as for having a GK shirt the same colour as the outfield shirt is just daft. Royal Blue & Sky Blue I can understand, but not Amber & Orange!
I know it isn’t as much of an issue but the Arsenal ‘Keeper kit was the same as the referee and linesman, don’t they have other options, for the Goalie or Ref
De Gea could have surely worn the blue ‘keeper shirt (wouldn’t’v clashed with the purple and black would it?) and then the officials could have worn green.
Re. Changing Socks
In the Bundesliga yesterday, FC Bayern played Hamburger SV. Bayern haven’t worn away shorts with the home strip for a long time, preferring the integrity of their all red strip, and couldn’t wear the standard away strip as it would have also clashed (HSV are known as the ‘Rote Hosen’ – Red Shorts, and never change these at home). This meant wearing the dark grey third, where the socks would have clashed. What was the outcome? ignoring it and hoping for the best? wearing the home or away socks where the colour/trim would’ve clashed horribly? no. adidas issued a pair of dedicated second choice socks, white with dark grey trim. Is it just me, or are clubs/the FA missing something in England that seems to be simplicity in Germany?
All the teams in the Premier League need to do is to organise what kits each other are going to wear before the season starts. And if there is a clash, just get alternate shorts/socks that won’t.
There seems to be a lack of planning in the Premier League and Football League unless individual teams do it themselves
I think the officials should wear black wherever possible, except if a team wears a strip that is too similar in colour or contrast. Also on the subject of goalkeeper kit clashes with the officials, I don’t recall anyone batting an eyelid in the days when goalkeepers, particularly in internationals, often wore a black strip.
And as for the comment about the Hull goalie, agree with that, and it ain’t the first time it’s happened – a few seasons ago Hull’s goalie wore a yellow jersey, whilst his team mates wore the amber home strip with had black stripes on the front. You would have thought Adidas would supply additional colours for their teams’ goalie strips, instead of just orange, gold or light blue; they’ve got other shirt designs of different colours available.
In addition I was quite surprised at Arsenal wearing a pair of alternate home socks with the away strip yesterday, given that in the past they’ve had an alternate pair for each of their choice of strips for quite a while. Mind you there was a time when Man U would often change their black socks for a white pair for a home match in the league as well, has that quirk been stopped?
United wore white socks v newcastle in the league cup,quite glad they never changed yesterday,not keen on it to be honest,United should always wear black socks at home and that includes european matches.
I haven’t watched as many games as I would like to have this season, so it may have slipped past past me, but have Chelsea worn their (very nice) white away kit yet?
Think they MAY have worn it in Europe, or maybe in one of the domestic cups, but the black (alleged) third kit has been used more in the league…can’t remember seeing Chelsea wear the white in the Prem. Most of the ‘blue’ teams have large quantities of white on their strips so the white (sadly) probably won’t get much use.
yesterday(tues 7th) Swansea’s U-21’s played at Ipswich. they wore their red away kit but with red short’s instead of the white pair they have worn in the premier league. seem’s team’s can wear proper non-clash kit’s when they want to.
Spurs will wear the Black and Silver halved shirt at City on Sunday. Surely all Navy would offer a better contrast as Silver and Sky Blue are quite similar? Madness
2 Keepers can have the same colour/similar on, as long as they don’t appear in the opposing area. It’s not supposed to happen but does when kitmen can’t agree and referees allow.
Matt nobody can prevent a keeper from going up to the other penalty area, it’s not ideal if they have similar colours, the officials just have to be extra vigilant. All keepers wore green for years and years and it was never a problem.
Yeah, it’s a shame it probably won’t get used much. Looking at John’s illustrations, the only place it’s almost guaranteed to be used is against Everton.
They might use it against West Brom, I suppose. What with West Brom’s home kit being predominately navy blue this season. Although I have a feeling that Chelsea will turn up at the Hawthornes with the black third kit.
Adam,
Think you’re probably right – WBA’s white shorts and socks will probably be considered sufficient to tell apart, even though navy and black could be considered a clash…I think that Chelsea should have called the white the third kit, seeing as it will get so little use. In the Bundesliga, my team FC Bayern have a white away kit and dark grey third, because the teams in Germany that play in red normally do so coupled with black, meaning that a white away sees plenty of action. It always boggles the mind that in England, where there are a LOT of blue and white striped teams right through the league, that kit suppliers don’t react in the same way. Surely it makes more sense from a marketing point of view? ie. more on the pitch use equals more cash through the till? Bayern’s white and flourescent red/orange shirt has had loads of use this season, and the dark grey third (officially called the ‘international’ strip) has been used for most of our games in Europe, meaning a good spread of sales for FCB and adidas. If I put my cynical head on, is that one of the reasons that Bayern have posted a profit for twelve years in a row and so many English clubs are in financial jeopardy? Every aspect counts, and strip choice/selection/marketing is surely as important as spending within your means and filling the stadium every week?
@543 – Our kitman told me thats what the Referee told him for a game last season.. For some reason the referee wouldn’t let us wear 2 of our 3 gk shirts and we have to wear one the same colour as the other keeper. The only condition was that as we couldn’t provide a suitably different colour shirt, he couldn’t go up for any last minute corners..
Fulham are another team that seem to use their 3rd kit more often than their away kit. I thought that first kit should be used where possible, then away kit and 3rd kit was only used where home and away both clashed.
Matt, your Ref sounds like a bit of a meverick. I always seem to do sides who’ve had such a ref the week before. “Last weeks Ref was OK with it…” or maybe they are trying to ‘play me’?
Matt, what team are we talking about here? I take it if you have a kitman it’s a decent level? It’s a ridiculous ruling from the ref, as surely one of the other two ‘keeper kits wouldn’t have caused a serious clash with outfield players or the opposition ‘keeper and if it was due to a clash with him (the ref) then it’d’ve been a better option.
I posed a trivia question on Twitter earlier and it didn’t get a sniff so I’ll try again here. The Spurs Third shirts today differed between themselves in that the long sleeved version had misaligned badges. Anyone know why that is? I’m 99.9% sure I know the answer…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0Tp0bHt5CE
Interesting and (as far as I can see) unnecessary socks change for Chelsea’s U18 team. I wonder if we’ll see this on the senior squad against Man. City later this season?
I can’t help thinking that Barcelona would have been better off wearing their home kit at Mallorca last night, rather than the orange and yellow away kit.
I see your point, Jon, but the third kit wasn’t really needed in the Mallorca game. The home would have sufficed.
They used the home kit away to Benfica in the Champions League, and they even have a red goalkeeper kit, which has been used with the home kit a few times this season. So it seems that red isn’t considered to clash with the home kit. Which I agree with.
Jay, a stab in the dark says that the long-sleeved shirts had misaligned badges as they were the ones that were always going to have a poppy printed on them but some Spurs players chose short sleeves instead. Have I won anything??
I believe, and I may be wrong, that a lot of manufacturers actually apply distinguishing details to (or remove them from) the upper central section of the front of long-sleeved football shirts so they can be easily identified when they are folded and packaged in a cellophane square for dispatch to clubs and retailers. Yes, they will generally have a serial number sticker and other identifying labels but stickers can fall off and mistakes can be made.
I’m not sure I’ve seen misaligned badges before but I have seen watermarks being removed and collars differing.
Check these two pictures of Paolo Maldini in the “same” shirt. The long-sleeved version has a round rather than v neck and moves the three gold stars to the sleeve too.
@ Jay29ers. Good point about the ref which makes me think the combination will be seen again with the first team. I think it may have been an inadvertent joke on your part too. After all Chelsea are good at “clashing” with referees lately!
Maybe things are relaxed for friendly matches? I just remembered a friendly between the two at Old Trafford in 2001, where both teams wore their home kit.
Also, it’s the same thing between England and Brazil. One team usually changes, an example being the match at the 2002 World Cup, when Brazil wore blue.
Yet when the two teams played each in other in friendlies in 2007, at Wembley, and in 2009, in Doha, both teams wore their home kits.
Adam,
You’re right, England normally play in their away kit when they play Sweden (most recently I think in the 2006 World Cup – featuring Joe Cole’s 30 yarder), but England tend to be more fluid when it comes to friendlies…maybe because their away strip at the mo is that dodgy navy and sky blue concoction and that was deemed to clash with Sweden’s home as well.
The liverpool kit is the best by far,its only missing a white v-neck!
Favourite of mine so far is definately Arsenal away! Closely followed by Swansea, stunning kit
Hate the Liverpool home – plain and boring, the only saving grace is the return of the Liverbird, and in answer to the controversy re. the Hilsborough tribute, the twin flames and the ’96’ on the back of the collar arguably give more exposure than everything being squashed into one badge. But why, oh why, didn’t they give it a white V-neck? one tiny detail could have changed a glorified polo shirt into one of the all time great retro/modern combinations. As far as the rest go, the Nike kits are just missing something in my opinion – best home/away sets come from adidas – Chelsea kits are classy, Swansea’s are simply stunning – away is gorgeous, using the Welsh colours is inspired. And on a final note, what is going on with Macron? their kits are just weird – I know it’s Championship rather than Prem, but Leeds new away kit has the most bizarre shorts design I have ever seen!
…I think Villa are wearing something similar as well Martyn! Difficult to get them across in my illustration style. Something about Macron I kinda like though
After some of the horrible change kits Chelsea have had in recent years, the white shirt with the sky blue sash looks really classy, and the faded effect on the three stripes looks brilliant. The home is not too shabby either.
Aston Villa have a really nice home shirt, but the less said about the monstrosity that is the change, the better.
Im not too impressed with the Man City home (mostly due to the monotone badge, though this does work better than on the current England kit), but I am very impressed with the change shirt, which has a wonderful burgundy and gold colour combo.
So far ….
Everton HOME
Fulham AWAY
are my faves
I’m not usually a Nike fan but really like the Arsenal kits. I just hope they look as good in the flesh as recent Nike kits have looked a bit ‘cheap & nasty’
A lot of sites seem to be carrying pictures of a grey & white Liverpool third kit which looks fantastic but there seems to be some doubt as to their authenticity.
@Mark Jessop
Isn’t the Liverpool third kit supposed to be purple? I’m I heard somebody mention that, as they criticising it for now really helping alleviate clashes, with the black away kit?
Excellent work, as usual, John!
Just some thoughts…
I love the Chelsea home kit. Simply stunning, and kind of appropriate now with the gold after the Champions League win. As most people do, I really like the away too.
The Liverpool home kit is great. Really smart from Warrior to just keep it simple. Especially after like seven years with the mandatory Adidas stripes. Not too sure about the way though. Just a bit too busy.
Man City home is nice, although I think it would have been better with plain black socks.
I don’t like the Arsenal kits, at all. The away is just an abomination, and is symbolic of Nike seemingly losing their minds. The home would have been fine, had it not been for the red stripe on the sleeves. Just odd.
The Everton away kit is good. I know that black kits tend to get a hard time on here, but I like them. Just simple and classy. The home is rubbish though, those cuffs, blimey… it looks even worse in action.
I like the Fulham kits. I have a soft spot for Kappa. There kits never seem to really change, and I mean that in a good way.
I’m not usually a fan of Macron, but I think their kits for Villa this season are okay. The home kit is very big though. I’m fine with the away, although I know most people hate it. I know fluorescent yellow is a bit out of fashion, but they have really run their course with white and black kits at Villa Park – so it’s nice to see something different.
Can’t wait to see the next lot…
Just out of interest, will you be doing article about the new kits, John? Also, will you be illustrating the new Championship kits?
Yes, the Liverpool third kit is purple:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2168700/Liverpool-unveil-new-kit.html
Thanks, Andrew.
That’s horrible, isn’t it?
I don’t know why Warrior didn’t just do the away and third, just like the home kit, but in white, and yellow.
Seeing as though it’s their first Liverpool kit.
The Liverpool 3rd kit is so dark that I can’t think of a situation where they could wear this rather than the red home shirt or black away shirt.
It is silly, Andrew.
They’ll probably just use it as “alternative away kit”.
You know, when they play teams in red, they’ll sometimes wear the black away, and sometimes wear the purple third.
Nice job again with the kits, John.
I’m a bit surprised there hasn’t been more discussion about the Man Utd home shirt. The gingham effect is terrible.
I am not a fan of the Liverpool away shirt, didn’t like grey and black in 2002-03 either but I think Warrior have done a great job with the home. It’s exciting to see both Warrior and Under Armour in the Premier League.
@waywardeffort
I think that’s because the Man United home has only been uploaded in the past hour, or so, along with the Newcastle away, and Man City away.
Yeah, the Man United home is awful. Just more proof that Nike have lost their minds. On that subject, I’m sure I heard that their away was going to be the same, but blue, but there are pictures going around of a white (in a different design) kit as the new away today…
The Liverpool third kit will be used more in Europe I believe.
Good point, Tardisblue.
EricGeneric: The blue United “away kit” you’ve seen is actually one of the keeper’s shirts.
I agree the Gingham is dreadful though. So galling to see City get so many classic kits in recent years while Nike give us rubbish like this. Suppose they’ve got that to look forward to next season though.
Rumour on the ground is that Arsenal will return to adidas from next season 13/14. To be honest this years Nike set are absolutely dreadful. Cheap looking rubbish. If that is how they plan on Kitting out Arsenal in the future then good luck to them. I actually don’t mind the gingham on United’s kit strangely enough.
best kits are liverpool’s home and city’s away. dont know how arsenal will manage away from home against villa or west ham this season. im assuming a white or yellow third kit will follow.
Most disappointed with Everton kits from Nike, well the home, as the away is quite smart but the home ones looks like average team wear kit and im presuming it is due to lack of team name on socks (which is usually the tell tale sign between team wear and bespoke with Nike and Adidas) and also them using the park gk kit where arsenal have a different design. Much preferred the Le Coq effort last year
@Tim
Thanks for that mate.
@David Morissey
Personally, I don’t think Arsenal will have a problem wearing their new away kit against Villa or West Ham, but they probably should retain the yellow kit again (obviously, it would pointless retaining last season’s blue away kit) just incase. I don’t think they will be launching a new third kit. None of the big Nike teams (Man United, Barcelona, Arsenal) seem to anymore, for the past three or four years. It seems to be a new home kit, and a new away, with last season’s away being the new third kit.
Actually, Arsenal are in the Champions League and I think you need to register three kits if you are playing in the Champions League or Europa League.
@David1986
Yeah, it seems Everton have took over from Fulham (from a couple of years ago) as the average Nike Premier League who don’t get unique designs…
By the way, what do people think of the Newcastle away kit? Have they used maroon as a change colour in the past?
The new Man.Utd home kit is awful,worst effort so far from Nike,its being marketed as ‘Made of Manchester’ as a referance to the cotton industry in Manchester.The irony being that the cotton trade died a death because of cheaper materials from the far east where the shirts are now made.
Couldn’t agree more john. I am not a fan of Man Utd but it’s interesting to read that even their fans don’t seem to like it. I’m all for experimentation (up to a point) on kits, but I thought it looked bad in pictures and then I saw it ‘in the flesh’…oh dear. One of my favourites now added to the site is the Reading home – restrained and classy use of red for the shoulder flash, and wider hoops that make the sponsor stand out better. Puma really seem to THINK about kits, unlike Nike and to a lesser extent Umbro who just seem to throw ideas out and hope that they stick. Honourable mention also to Kappa and the Fulham away – orange is an unusual colour choice for them, but with white and black is really classy.
With you on Reading, Martyn. That new Puma template has been modeled in XXL by the likes of Sheffield Wednesday but Reading have worn it in the right size and it looks fantastic.
Notice that the (short) sleeves are still slim cut but are now longer. Sure it’s either following fashions (what do I know?) or just trying to step away from the pack. Looks great either way, as does the larger profile sponsor and use of red. One of my favourites for the new season.
Sorry to go off topic, but I’m watching my recording of the Team GB versus Brazil match, as I couldn’t watch it live.
Anyway, I was just wondering, have Team GB got an away kit for the Olympics?
Yes they do, it’s the same design as the home short which the UJ in silver/grey
Thanks, Davidr1986.
What are people’s thoughts on the kit? I don’t like it at all, really. It’s just trying to be too clever. Maybe I am boring but I think they would have been better off with a basic Adidas design, in a red shirt, white shorts, and blue socks.
The thing is Eric, Team GB have that design in all of the sports so it has to fit into that rather than being a stand-alone
I do agree, Eric, but I would have liked to see the proper UJ colours used instead of that turquoise colour – I wondered what Stella McCartney was thinking when I saw it unveiled! But it’s true – if it had been designed by the adidas team instead of a fashion designer it would have been much nicer. Missed opportunity in my opinion. Nb. They should have stuck with the initial designs as modelled by Gareth Bale last year.
nike have done 2 nice kit’s for Celtic this year. not sure about both kit’s having dark sock’s though. the Arsenal away has the same design as Celtic’s away.
I think there is a rational explanation for Everton having teamwear kits. The deal with Nike was only signed back in March, and I’ve read that Nike get their bespoke kit designs off the drawing board and into production well in advance of the following season. As a result of the deal being signed after the cut-off point, Everton had to settle for teamwear designs in the colours of their choosing, which have a quicker lead-time for production. I know this happened with Galatasaray, who signed a late deal with Nike and had to wear teamwear designs in their colours last season.
They have a bespoke set of kits for this coming season, so my guess is that Everton will follow suit for season 2013/14.
I know Fulham wore a few Nike Teamwear kits a few years back, but their deal was with Just Sport, who I think also arrange deals with other clubs wearing Nike Teamwear style designs.
Eric, David, Martyn & Denis, the Away shirt is white with very light silver/grey Union Flag stuff. Personally I would have liked to have seen GB wear white shirt, blue shorts and red socks like the hockey team (who didn’t really get the Stella McCartney treatment it seems http://bit.ly/PqNUIf, save for the bizarre ladies’ skirt).
Plus, and I do go on about this but I maintain it’s a valid point http://bit.ly/HpZil8, the Team GB shirt has one navy sleeve and one predominantly white sleeve, so it’s about time we had baselayers that matched. In Blackburn games last season you had players with one white sleeved forearm and one blue (wearing long sleeves) and some with two white sleeved forearms (wearing short sleeves over baselayers).
Also, am I right in thinking that national association logos are banned from the Olympic football tournament? So what Brazil were wearing last night would go against regulations and they’ll have to put a flag over the crest?
How does it work in terms of national association manufacturer v olympic kit manufacturer? Will Spain wear adidas or something along these lines? http://bit.ly/OfXNsT
Jay,
My understanding is that the Great Britain situation is unique in world football – it’ll probably just be the badges that change, as you say. Sweden ladies played GB last night and just wore the same Umbro kit that the ‘full’ team wear, so Spain will probably do the same – obviously the star for the World Cup win will be removed, but I would expect it to be the EC ’12 template – of course, adidas brought out a special Spain kit for the last Confederations Cup, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they do the same for the Olympics.
adidas aren’t making the Spain kit, apparently it’s this http://p.twimg.com/AyAeswECEAE3jFS.jpg
As well, Spurs’ new third kit is meant to be navy and grey stripes, which will hardly solve a clash against West Brom
Yeah, that’s what linked to, Denis. It won’t be that though, will it? That’s a leisure top or shooting or something isn’t it? Look forward to seeing it if it is that brand. I quite like the track tops http://bit.ly/LAZ5fO
It think it’s inevitable that Spurs will wear a goalkeeper kit outfield against West Brom.
Sorry, missed that Jay. Inevitable, indeed
That spain gear is awful,is it supplied by the same firm who make the fake barca/real madrid/man utd etc gear you see hanging outside beach chops in Spain!
Spain is the talk of the kit world right now.What about this monstrosity
http://tinyurl.com/brgf34l
I love the line in the article that said Hummel had only 10 days to think up both home and away kits. I believe them.
I’m sure Tottenham will just wear their home kit at the Hawthornes, with the navy blue away shorts and socks.
We have seen lots of teams wear white against stripes…
I do agree though, having a white home, navy blue away, and dark grey third – is not ideal.
I can’t imagine any ref allowing navy/white-white-white against white-navy-navy
Really? I don’t think it’s a problem, although I know you have more of a problem with “overall clashes” than I do, Denis.
I remember going to West Brom versus Sheffield United during the 1999/2000 season, as I was living near the Hawthornes at the time, and Sheffield United turned up in their away kit, which was white-black-black – against Albion’s navy/white-white-white – and I had no problem with it.
Actually, I just found it on YouTube, amazingly!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqOWUDvXxJM
That’s shockingly bad, almost as bad as Arsenal v Charlton in 2000!
Yeah, a prime example of why “overall clashes” can be the worst. In fact, surely they’re the worst by definition?
The Spurs/West Brom situation would be best resolved by Spurs wearing all white and WBA wearing navy change shorts and socks.
Or Spurs wearing a goalkeeper kit!
Maybe in practice Spurs in the away kit won’t be that much of a clash, I can recall Newcastle wearing home shirts with white shorts and socks away to Wimbledon in mid-90s.
Though I’ve just realised that WBA’s home has navy sleeves this year, so maybe not
The worst bit about the West Brom v Sheffield United game from 99/00 was the fact that the Blades had retained the previous season’s illuminous yellow away strip as a third choice kit. Why didn’t they wear that?
It’s annoying when a team has a change strip which resolves a kit clash issue but wears a home or away strip which results in a clash. Arsenal did that at Blackpool last season of course.
As for Spurs, someone in their management who decided on the kits should have realised that the silver/black kit is completely superfluous and does not in any way resolve colour clashes for the home and away shirts. Whilst they may get away with wearing navy at Newcastle (given their new home kit is 80% white), the West Brom fixture is a different proposition.
Ironically Newcastle had a pointless away kit in the 02/03 season in silver and some bluey-green colour, which they ended up wearing at….. yes you guessed it, West Brom, on the final day of the season (a shocking kit clash).
I guess I was the only who didn’t have a problem with the Albion/Sheffield United kits then? haha!
I just found a picture of the Arsenal/Charlton game from 2000, Denis. I really don’t see the problem. I guess I just don’t get this “overall clash” thing. I mean, I see your point, but I just don’t agree.
You have to go with “does the home shirt clash the away shirt”, “do the shorts clash with the shorts?” and “do the socks clash with the socks?”.
To be honest, I think that is the way most referees look at it too…
I’m not so sure that they do Eric – for example, take Watford v Southampton in the 2003 FA Cup semi-final – Watford changed from red to black shorts and socks, which were Southampton’s normal first-choice colours, and the Saints had to wear white shorts and socks.
Looking at something in a close-up picture is fine and it’s easy to tell teams apart, but in a match situation, where it often seems like a blur of players, it can be very difficult.
Like I say, I see your point, I guess we just have to agree to disagree buddy 🙂
I suppose it’s the whole teams wearing the same colour thing, which I have a bit of a problem with. What I mean is, I remember when Chelsea played Birmingham in the FA Cup last season. Chelsea obviously wear blue-blue-white, and Birmingham’s change kit is yellow-white-white. But Birmingham changed to blue socks, because of Chelsea wearing white.
I remember you saying that “Birmingham changing to blue socks, actually caused more of a overall clash” Meaning they maybe should of wore white sock, like Chelsea. That just seems all wrong to me. I’d rather there be more of a “overall clash”, than both teams wearing the same colour socks.
Did I say that it’d have been better with Brum in white socks? If so, then I’ve changed my mind now as I don’t think two teams should have the same socks either, they should have had yellow!
Oh and similar to Arsenal-Charlton, in 2008 at the Emirates Liverpool wore their home shorts and socks with their grey away, caused quite the confusion
I’m with Denis on this one. Something to consider is perspective with one player standing yards behind another. White, blue, white can be confused with blue, white, blue in the eyeline to seem like, at a glance, two players are teammates. This is particularly important for the linesman when deciding on offsides when there’s a crowded area.
I agree that no teams should wear the same colour socks – that’s even more important, for tackles etc – but if there’s a socks clash then the replacement socks chosen should not be in the colour of the opposition’s shorts.
…This is why I see method in the madness of the – supposed – one colour kits Uefa directive. Italy vs France is generally all blue v all white (or all white v all blue) and if it was blue, white, blue v white, blue, white or even white, blue, white v blue, white, red then it could cause difficulty for officials and compromise the ease of viewing for spectators.
the worst kit clash i saw was my team Ipswich wearing their abbot ale sponsored cream(ecru) and back striped kit 2 years in a row at West Brom. even worse that one of the games was an evening game. seasons involved were 96/97 and 97/98. 96/97 town had the green and maroon away as a third kit as well. the only difference was Ipswich’s kit had black short’s.
Sounds Grim Scott (pun intended), any pics?
Anyone see the Team GB-New Zealand women’s game? Don’t worry if you didn’t, they’re rubbish, but I assume New Zealand’s women’s wear white as Home colours whereas they were wearing black and Team GB were in the white Away (shorts and socks are boring and plain).
The only thing I can think of is that because NZ were representing the Olympic team they were wearing the colours of that, which are probably predominantly black.
Also, France’s women were wearing adidas teamwear (reasonable style) rather than Nike so it does look as though Spain will be wearing something resembling the crap we’ve seen in pictures. Looking forward to that.
Wow, some GREAT comments here people, True Colours visitors are definitely the most intelligent football kit commentators out there!
Interesting to hear the clash arguments. Personally in theory I don’t have a problem with white shirts against striped shirts – however with designers these days obsessed with not keeping the stripes simple you do get occasions where there is a large proportion of white (eg on sleeves/yokes etc) where it does become an issue. Look at Man Utd’s 70s/80s penchant for wearing blue at Arsenal for example. The WBA/Sheff Wed was a good example of a situation that although wasn’t a drastic clash per se, visibilty all round for both teams, refs and fans could have been improved with sensible kit selection. Which is the point Denis made about Arsenal vs Blackpool a season or so ago.
In this day and age with awareness and experience of kits at a peak there is no reason why the teams cannot be attired in a way to make them clearly different. Surely it makes the refs job easier (although interestingly this is a topic that no pundits ever pick up on!) and makes the players jobs easier.
Anyone noticed Blackburn’s kits for next season? Blue/white halved home, navy away and white third….lights touch paper and stands back…
Questionable alright John (especially if they are drawn away to WBA in a cup), though the navy should just about work against royal and white sides, as it did for Everton a few years ago
I saw the new navy blue away kit being promoted, and just assumed they were retaining the yellow away kit from last season, as the third kit for the new season.
46. Jay, why should Albion change at home because of another club’s poor planning?
The Baggies kit does seem to be a problem for some clubs. I was at the Newcastle game and it was awful, as was the Stoke game last year. Our home kit had a lot of white last year, meaning dark kits were fine. This one has far more navy, so it should be interesting!
They are awful too. I know they don’t have a sponsor yet but they look like training tops. Terrible.
By the way, Denis, Birmingham actually did have yellow change socks, to go with that yellow-white-white third kit.
I saw a video of their academy wearing them.
Strangely though, the first team never did. If ever they needed to use change socks, they just used the blue pair from the home kit.
Oh I know Eric, I saw pics, just makes it odder!
I knew someone would pull me up on that, Statto.
They shouldn’t, but as they have often worn navy shorts and navy socks (though curiously not recently together) as first choice home items I didn’t think it was too much of an affront to their identity.
I doubt I need to assert again that my preference is Spurs wearing a goalkeeper kit.
You’re obsessed with teams wearing goalkeeper kits, Jay! 😛
I agree with Statto. If it is a problem, which I personally don’t think it is but anyway, then Tottenham should have to change.
I miss the old days when the away team would have to use the home teams away kit…
Yeah, but if Tottenham have nothing to change into that’ll help, which is the problem, then my idea is a solution.
I actually don’t think Spurs wearing ‘keeper kits would work. It’d have to be the green and it would actually look ridiculous. Not like if England wore their red gk kit…
Old days? Marseille wore Auxerre’s Away kit in 2007-08.
It just seems to happen less and less, that’s all. It seems that nine times out of ten, the home teams just wears their away kit.
Like the season before the last, which I think was the last time it happened in the Premier League, in the match between Aston Villa and West Ham. A few years before, it would have been West Ham having to borrow that white Villa kit.
That’s the way it should be, as it is their fault, as the away team.
Although, teams wearing different branding is probably a much bigger issue than it was at one time.
I just noticed on the Arsenal Wikipedia page (I know! Before anyone says anything) that they have last season’s navy and light blue away kit, as the third kit.
Has this been confirmed anywhere?
Seems pointless. You would think they would have to retain the yellow kit again…
Yeah, that’s been a confusing thing about the new away. They do need a light change kit and the only way would be to keep the 2010-11 Away for a third season (reverting to its original crest). I actually expected a new release third kit, which would be poor form for Arsenal, but surely they won’t keep the navy and sky blue thing.
…Unless they want to unveil a new range of Nike baselayers with alternate sleeves! If Van Persie toddles off then the new captain might be into that.
Isn’t it really odd that Portsmouth have worn the white and maroon 2010/11 away kit in their two pre-season.
It wasn’t even retained as a third kit, last season.
Just strange.
http://i.imgur.com/sdEsz.png
The Everton kit is nice, but it would look so much better with white socks. Last year’s blue socks looked good because of the amber trim, but this year’s kit should have white, to make it look more like an Everton kit, as opposed to so many teams that wear blue-white-blue kits.
Currently reading Paul Lake’s autobiography and there’s a picture in it from a game which is a good example of why solving a shorts clash can add to overall clash IMO.
In 89-90, City wore their away shorts at Villa, but rather than go with a mismatching sky-maroon-navy, they changed socks too:
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/sport-football-league-division-one-villa-park-birmingham-news-photo/79024622
Just seen Chelsea’s new third kit – another stunning design from adidas. They will now be one of the best dressed teams in the Prem. Simple combination: Home – Blue & gold; Away – White & sky blue; Third – Black & yellow. Covers every eventuality, avoiding clashes as described above. Anyone agree?
Yeah, agree, Denis. Though I think the efforts now being put in to avoid “overall clashes” might spoil us a little and if we see games like that Villa-City example we may get lazy and tell ourselves we can’t make who’s who when really it’s not that bad.
Martyn, like the Chelsea Away, though the gradient on the stripes I think is overkill. Should’ve saved that for a plainer template. The sash was enough on that kit.
I think the Third is a great one to wear to football training but not ideal for wearing with jeans (I’m not being ironic here). adidas obviously decided they’d underused the “coloured abs” approach from the France 2010 World Cup shirt and it’s obviously done with techfit in mind. I think it works for its purpose but just on basic aesthetics (and on a standard replica) it’s a bit too modern.
@Martyn Ping
Erm, if a lot of you guys weren’t happy with the West Brom v Sheffield United kit clash from 99/00 – what will Chelsea do at the Hawthornes this season? It seems to me they can’t wear the home or third kit, so that means the away, no? 😛
Jay – Think we have to agree to disagree on that one. I’m an FC Bayern fan and I love our new third kit with the orangey red flashes on the chest – provided it’s not too OTT (like the mid 90’s Umbro paint splash effect used on Forest and Aberdeen to name but two) then I think its fine…the Chelsea one I thought was snazzy without pushing things too far.
Eric – Anticipated this one! I would think that as the WBA is mostly navy, Chelsea will use the standard away shirt, which is light enough to avoid clashing, with new shorts. The last Bayern away kit was initially unveiled with navy shorts but with the majority of red teams in the Bundesliga also wearing dark shorts adidas soon came out with a white alternative pair – maybe they will issue a sky blue pair to go with the shirt? Alternatively I can think of loads of occasions where a team playing primarily in blue use a black away kit against a blue & white striped team – maybe the amount of yellow will be seen as enough differentation?
They can wear the home, they’ve done it quite a bit, 02-03 for definite anyway
Have they, Denis? I never knew that :S
I reckon Chelsea’s away kit will have a pair of navy alternative shorts, to match the socks. They do have an alternative set of white socks for the kit too, having worn them in pre-season.
As for their choice of kit for the fixture at West Brom, I reckon they’ll use the home kit, it contrasts with West Brom’s new home shirts which are predominantly navy.
Last season Chelsea wore black, but that was down to West Brom’s shirts being predominantly white, plus the home shirt had the large white panels on the shoulders, which might have caused an issue.
Also forgot to mention, in the last decade Chelsea wore their home kit at the Hawthorns, because their change kits would have clashed.
02/03
Away – navy (the midnight navy strip)
Third – white
04/05
Away – black
Third – white (the Regal King Size strip)
05/06
Away – sky blue (very light shade almost like white)
Third – black
Another note in 05/06 – West Brom wore their home kit at Stamford Bridge, but also that season had these strange kit choices: _
Home – navy/white stripes (but plain white on the back)
Away – navy with red and white sash
Third – all white (previous season’s third strip)
They didn’t retain the perfectly suitable red strip from the previous season, and had to wear the navy strip at Blackburn and Newcastle.
Thanks for that, Jon.
I’ve never seen Chelsea wear their home kit at the Hawthornes. Must have just happened to miss Match of the Day on those weeks!
Interesting that Albion wore their home kit at Stamford Bridge in 05/06. They did at Birmingham also. You would have thought that at both Stamford Bridge and St. Andrews, they would have just worn the white third kit.
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/martin-latka-of-birmingham-city-is-tackled-by-junichi-news-photo/57057444
I think if they can get away with it a lot of teams will try to wear Home kits in local derbies. Newcastle-Sunderland being a prime example.
With you on that again, Denis. The best thing for Chelsea at West Brom will be to wear their Home, probably with the change Home socks http://bit.ly/Pcxims
Martyn, I don’t necessarily have a problem with all garish details on football shirts, what I mean is that techfit shirts (or shirts with techfit in mind) that accentuate contours of a muscular physique probably don’t work too well on an overweight chap in the Blackbird or wherever before the game. It’d be a little bit like the copy, er, bats in The Dark Knight.
Jay,
Fair comment – I remember those skin tight Kappa shirts from a few years back – thankfully they didn’t supply Bayern kits! It’s not uncommon for kit suppliers to ‘map’ the outline of muscles on shirts – Nike did it a few years ago. I don’t neccesarily think adidas designed it purely with Techfit in mind though – they seem to use Chelsea away/third shirts to wildly experiment – I’m thinking of last seasons black with the sky blue ‘net’ on it, and I seem to remember their first away shirt (or it might have been third) was flourescent yellow! Interestingly, John has now added the Swansea away – I think that one is stunning as well.
One final point: Which bright spark at Umbro had the idea of getting rid of Southamptons traditional stripes for their return to the Prem? Surely a striped home shirt, and a yellow and blue away (ie. a bit of tradition) would have been the best policy?
I know they’re not in the Prem no more, but just seen the Blackburn third kit that John said about in post no. 60…… a crazy decision to choose to wear a white third kit, and also looks like an off-the-peg Umbro effort worn by lots of lower league, Sunday league and pub teams.
Mind you the way Venky’s run that club, I’m not surprised.
Back to the Premier League and as for Southampton, I heard their new kit has divided the Saints faithful. It looks more like a recreation of the final Umbro kit worn by the great Liverpool side in the 80’s.
It isn’t the first time Southampton have strayed away from the traditional stripes, such as the “reversed Ajax” kit from the early 80’s as worn by Kevin Keegan and co, the red shirt from 1985, and the half and half Hummel kit which was almost identical to the Danish kit from 1986….. but all those kits had black shorts and white socks for contrast. This is just an all-red strip that smells of “re-brand”. The away strip reminds me of Sunderland’s kit made by Le Coq Sportif in the early 80’s.
Though I’ve heard the yellow and blue away strip from last season is going to be retained, but not confirmed yet.
I don’t like these ‘rebrands’ that seem to be going around at the moment – I think the Cardiff situation is just horrendous. Being a fan of your books, I know which kits you mean, but the ‘reverse Ajax’ Southampton was a partial compromise between stripes and plain. As you said though, they at least had the black shorts to keep a part of tradition going! I personally am dissapointed by the majority of Umbro kits for this coming season – I don’t know if it’s the uncertainty of Nike selling the company, but I get the distinct impression their heart has gone out of it – too many templates are being used ad infinitum, where Nike, Puma, and adidas at least vary the trim/collar/shadow combination. All the more dissapointing when back in the mid 90’s they were nigh on untouchable. Anyone agree? What about Man Utd fans? would they rather have the classic Umbro home kit from 94-96 (with the Old Trafford shadow pattern) or this seasons gingham monstrosity?
…Not a fan of Nike’s new kits, as you can probably tell! New Arsenal home isn’t bad though – the arm stripes which people seem divided on reminds me of a sort of RAF/mod/Ben Sherman motif…Away shirt is hideous though.
I’m quite a fan of the Arsenal home too, always like it when navy is the third colour
If anyone wants to see a truly ridiculous clash, have a look on ITV player for the 8th July edition of the Big Match Revisited. Skip to the last game (through numerous adverts) and you can see Coventry wearing their TV kit, which had a sky blue T covering most of the front with a white back and a black number. They were playing Manchester City who were wearing white shirts… with a black number. From behind they look identical. I assume City only had the 2 kits at the time.
Something even dafter I remember from a few years back was Port Vale wearing black and white striped shirts with a plain white back and black number. They were playing Lincoln, who rather than wear their home red and stripes all the way round wore their away plain white shirt with a black number. I can only assume they forgot the home shirts.
Back on topic, Man City’s home kit would be greater if it had navy instead of black. QPR’s kits aren’t up yet, but if you want truly pointless, what’s the best colour to use for a 3rd kit if you wear blue and white hoops? Sky blue of course. I suppose they could wear it against West Brom…
Nice kit but utterly daft as a playing kit, though doubtless it’ll sell as well as any other kit. Possibly not as bad as Blackburn’s kits, which are.blue and white halves, blue and white. I suspect they might need a 4th kit for Sheffield Wednesday.
Agree with you on City kit James, they had navy trim when I began watching football so it’s part of their ‘proper’ colours in my book!
Can’t Blackburn wear Navy shirts with White shorts & socks at Hillsborough this season?
I think the white third kit would be the better option for the Hillsborough match.
Denis is going to hate that!
It’s unlikely Eric, but I wouldn’t hate it, as all-white would provide enough contrast IMO.
If Wednesday had white shorts though and Blackburn wore the third as is, then I think it would cause problems.
Do you mean “it’s unlikely” because you think Blackburn will wear the navy away kit?
I think so, but the more I think about it I’m not sure, especially as Wednesday have dark shorts and socks. We could well see a fourth kit
For the last 2 years whenever we (Barnsley) have played Sheffield United/Doncaster (Red/White Stripes/hoops) We’ve worn Away (white) shirts – I dont think the Referees are too fussed about it.
You haven’t had red shorts in either season though, I’d say that was a key factor in allowing it
Changing the subject…..I was watching ‘The Big Match Revisited’ recently from February 1983 and Arsenal were away to Middlesbrough in the cup. Being of a certain age and an Arsenal fan I remember the game well. What I can’t understand was ‘Boro (being the home team) wore that seasons red shirt / white shorts but with blue socks. Arsenal wore their tremendous green and blue of the time. Does anyone know why ‘Boro changed socks that day (the regular socks that year were white.)
Not sure, but on that Arsenal green kit, its been usurped as the worst change kit the gunners have had by this seasons effort IMHO. That template has been used by quite a few teams quite well (PSG, Monterrey, Kaizer Chiefs), but the Arsenal shirt is awful. It could have been decent if it was gold/yellow for the shirt and blue for the shorts.
Also, considering Reading are playing in the Premiership, its a bit of a let down them playing in cheap teamwear this season, the style used by the African teams or the top puma style would have been so much nicer than something picked from a catalogue.
Also, the new Norwich home kit is very nice, but as its very similar to the old one, was there really a need? Norwich have played in shirts with green sleeves, halved shirts and have had white shorts and black shorts in the past, so its a bit dissapointing not to see errea (Who have made some awesome kits in the past and made really good shirts for Boro in the past) sticking with yellow shirts/green shorts/yellow socks.
It was down to superstition Ronan, included a link while ago which is awaiting approval
Thanks for that Denis, quick one for you: Cork and Galway will lock horns again shortly, are you (like myself) thinking that neither team will change? (for those who are unaware, the Cork colours are red-white-red, Galway maroon-white-maroon and it’s rare that we see a change strip when they play). Agree with ‘Spiderbait’ about the new Arsenal away – a total disaster and embarrassment to a fine club.
Ronan, IMO there is zero chance of a change. Galway wore white for a football league game in 03 and Cork did so in hurling, but other than Galway wearing maroon shorts in a few meetings in the 80s, these are the only changes apart from the 1973 All-Ireland football final.
Re Boro, they had been forced to change socks in previous round v Notts County and Malcolm Allison decided to keep the blue for remainder of cup run
A mate of mine said it all about the Arsenal away shirt….. “looks like one of them hoodie tops worn by 15 year old emo girls”…… priceless!
I’d be surprised if Arsenal did retain the navy/turquoise strip from last season as a third strip, but mind you the yellow kit was no longer for sale this time last year and did get used against Milan…… though why they didn’t wear it at Villa I don’t know. We’ll have to see when the Premier League Handbook gets released, it did say July 2012 but whether that is just to the clubs and not in the public domain I’m unsure, but will be interesting to see the third kits that haven’t been revealed yet.
#104 – I thought of that myself yesterday Ronan.
They dont seem to change whenever they meet which is at least once every 1/2 years nowadays.
I dont about football but I’d be fairly certain that maroon and red clashes require a change.can any of the true colours flock sort this query out?
Any thoughts on Spurs new home shirt.
I like the style of shirt myself but I’m not so keen on the white shorts/socks that go with it.
Hvaing viewed it in a shop it is more like a running top than a traditional kit but thats Under Armour for you I suppose
I’ve seen teams wear plain red against claret (blue sleeves) in the past, but not for a good while. The last example I can think of was Man U wearing red at West Ham in 1996, possibly because they had lingering jitters about their grey kit before it went postal at The Dell.
I know Villa wore their home kit at Arsenal in 1999, but that was when they had the broad claret and blue striped kit. They wore alternate sky blue shorts that day too, though they had a turquoise third kit available which wasn’t called upon.
But as for plain claret, maroon, burgundy, cardinal red, whatever you want to call it, there’s usually been a change against a team in plain red.
Actually, I found a worse example from a bit sooner….. this time 96/97, when Arsenal wore their home kit at Villa. Worse, it was rather sunny too.
The result…
http://cache3.asset-cache.net/gc/1252230-sep-1996-ian-wright-of-arsenal-gets-to-the-gettyimages.jpg?v=1&c=IWSAsset&k=2&d=OCUJ5gVf7YdJQI2Xhkc2QHIG03%2biPFF%2bxup2ZX2%2bMkAdpqbHEdpX6JCpYjBzFdFpUsMqxcsre376T3za41aseA%3d%3d
From what I can gather, the yellow away kit Arsenal had that season wasn’t available until a few months later. In fact I remember they wore the previous away kit (navy with turquoise thunder flash) at Liverpool in the August, on TV.
Amazingly, these teams are wearing change kits http://www.sportsfile.com/id/470880/
You’re right about the 96-97 Arsenal away Jon, I remember McManaman scoring twice in a 2-0 win. I think yellow and navy was first worn at Old Trafford in October (Winterburn og)?
Interesting article on the official Liverpool site:
http://www.liverpoolfc.com/news/latest-news/lfc-to-wear-red-after-kit-clash
They’re going to wear the purple kit in EVERY European game unless there’s a clash.
That is stupid, to me Liverpool always wear red unless there is a clash…… also FK Homel’ wear a Hibs-like green and white, so unless it was the white sleeves that did it, who knows?
I can’t imagine them wearing it at Anfield…..
They’re getting like those French teams with their bizarre changed coloured strips in Europe.
I really would not like it if that were the case, it would be a sad day, especially for a club like Liverpool with such a strong pedigree of winning in Europe wearing red
Talk about a marketing fail. It’s officially the Third Kit but it’s first choice in Europe? At least adidas/Nike call kits released with that in mind “European” or “International”.
Saw a father and son wearing it in Cardiff earlier – father short sleeves, son long – and it doesn’t really seem purple. Navy with the slightest purple hue perhaps. Certainly not the “nightshade” of colour charts.
Oh and it’s awful. Truly, truly hideous.
…Crucially though, two people were wearing it. I saw no other Liverpool shirts in Cardiff.
Cha-ching.
Is anyone else annoyed by the fact that Spurs have white shorts?
IMO they should be reserved for European games only, or obviously matches where there is a clash.
Couldn’t agree more Denis, Spurs should always wear blue shorts. I’ve always thought that they’ve looked good in white shorts when they do play in Europe, can’t explain why though but I believe that’ve done it since the ’60’s (and this is from an Arsenal fan!), obviously a tradition of theirs and not a bad one. But other than that they should be wearing blue shorts and every Spurs fan I speak to seems to agree. Luckily for us traditionalists they will wear blue shorts in defeat at the Emirates this coming season………
Agreed Ronan. Another European shorts tradition, though one which we are not likely to see revived, is Man Utd with red shorts.
Not a hope in hell of ever seeing Man Unted in red shorts ever again. Strange to think that they wore that combination years before their old buddies along the M62 ever did.
On the same token you won’t see Liverpool wear white shorts with the home jerseys ever again either.
Or Chelsea with blue shirts and white shorts, I’d imagine.
Odd how they had no problem doing it as recently as 1990-91 (AFAIK), but then just stopped, even though Spurs would change for games at Stamford Bridge
87/88 was the last time Chelsea wore white shorts with the home shirt, and that was at Spurs.
Did they not do it in a Rumbelows Cup tie the night that the Gulf War started?
Not kit related at all so I apologise for going of topic but In Leeds game against Preston yesterday I’ve noticed that the Leeds team featured White, Gray, Green and Brown. Has a team ever featured more ‘colours’?
Apologies Jon, my memory playing tricks again http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBIrotjyNPE&feature=related
It’s nice to see that Kappa have finally given Portsmouth a new home kit, for the upcoming season.
Kinda thought they weren’t going to bother, at one point.
It looks like they are just having last seasons black, and red and black as the away and third kits though.
Post 128 Eric Generic, Portsmouth’s new kit for next season could yet become a collectors item the way things are going.
You might be right there, David.
Let’s hope not though…
are you goig to put the championship kits on here John?.
Im not sure what all the fuss is about the Man U home kit. I get the design is not for everyone but on the pitch the gingham pattern has a subtle effect and the actual design of the shirt with the black v collar and lack of piping and trim is undestated and classic. I think people feel the need to hate on it because it is United mostly. The white away kit is in a different class though. Really nice.
I don’t think it’s that Noel, I don’t like Man U at all and I loved last season’s home, quite like this year’s away too, apart from the shorts, just think that pattern doesn’t belong on a kit
You know, Noel, I didn’t like the Man United home kit when I first saw it, but it’s really started to grow on me.
The gingham is bit more subtle than I first thought it would be, and I’m kind of wishing the away kit was the same but in blue now! haha!
The actual away kit, which everyone else seems to like, does nothing for me at all.
But you know that they’d never do two blue away kits in a row?!
I wasnt a big fan of last seasons home kit. The collar seemed odd and the overall feel and quality of the shirt wasnt great. This seasons if you can get past the gingham ( and I realise that is a big ask for some people lol) has a much better overall design and quality. Gotta say though after watching the Real Madrid game this evening I am very impressed with the Madrid home jersey.
My main problem with the Man Utd home shirt is the lack of white in it. Man Utd shirt should be red and white not red and black
I know, Denis.
With the last away kit being blue (and black), I knew this years one would be white.
I just don’t really see what everyone sees in it, really.
As a United fan i can’t stand the home kit,its awful,looks like a thermos flask!! The Away kit at least goes back to the traditional away colours(in my eyes) but its not perfect,the badge needs to be in colour and the shorts are checkered for some reason,the best bit is the socks!
Yeah, the away shorts being checkered is odd.
Maybe Nike are cutting back on costs and had them checkered so they can be used as the home change shorts aswell! 😛
Oh why would you do it, Eric? Cue Denis…
I heard my name being mentioned?
I wonder what kit Liverpool will wear in Europe after being drawn against Hearts? Home shirt clashes with maroon, the Euro away/third clashes with maroon, the away kit is dubious due to the contrast in UEFA’s colourblind eyes…..
I saw Man U’s away kit in action the other day, the shorts make it look like a pyjama set in all honesty….. though not as bad as Celtic’s “international away kit” tartan shorts effort in 2009!
Loved those shorts, Jon. Won’t hear a word said against them. A pal constantly winds me up by reminding me that he has a pair and I don’t.
Liverpool will probably wear the black Away against Hearts. With Hearts wearing white shorts it shouldn’t be too bad.
On a somewhat related note, has anyone ever known a club to change kit manufacturer but keep the same bespoke lettering and numbering font? Incredibly cheap from Liverpool and in my own twisted head they’re now a laughing stock (due to this in particular, wags) whereas no one else has probably even noticed.
On a totally different sport but sportswear related,did anyone notice that whilst Great Britain(i refuse to use the marketing term ‘TeamGB’) all wore adidas in all sports,Germany..adidasland..wore different manufacturers in different sports.Thought all their gear would have been adidas? Even saw Germany athletics team in nike!!
Liverpool kept the same numbering ans lettering because it was the club that developed that custom font rather than adidas.
Yeah that was surprising alright John.
I see Rangers had to wear training tops yesterday at Peterhead as their black away with blue pinstripes was deemed to clash with Peterhead’s blue.
Anyone watching the Community Shield?
I’m amazed the referee is letting the Man City goalkeeper wear that kit!
And, just before kick off, the referee has made him change to yellow.
Good call, although you would think the referee would have noticed before the match!
AJ, I don’t actually believe that it was a pre-planned (or adequately planned) decision to keep the font, rather a marketing oversight. Is it not the third season of that style? I understand it’s likely to have been produced with Sporting ID in discussion with the club rather than adidas but a new kit should have a new font, as Chelsea have despite not even leaving adidas.
I agree with the white continuing despite the gold details but something could have been created to complement the style of the new kit. Retro white numbers with yellow/gold outline perhaps?
Surely the Man City kit manager would have known that the mauve kit would have caused a clash with Chelsea? To confuse matters even moreso, the yellow strip that Pantilimon wore was already prepared with logos and fonts applied, he even changed shorts and socks at half time…. why couldn’t he wear that from the start?
As for the thing about Liverpool carrying over fonts to a different supplier, I think Tottenham are doing likewise by wearing their custom typeface in cup competition. Also I know the FAW did it with the Welsh kits when changing over from Champion to Umbro in 2010.
Fabulous knowledge, Jon. Thanks for that. Still don’t agree with it but can partly understand Spurs doing it as their Euro name/numbering (especially the latter) are great.
Didn’t see Shield, was it difficult to tell teams apart? Is it the case that sky blue will be City’s best option at Stamford Bridge, as their away is dark too?
You know something, I kinda miss teams having their own typefaces on their shirts, it adds their own individuality to their kit, rather than having another money making arm of the corporate Premier League beast thrust upon them in the form of their own numbers and letters. UEFA even tried that trick and even though their font set is still used by a handful of teams, clubs have put whatever they want on shirts. Well except stripes on the back, but that’s another stupid regulation best kept to another forum for discussion.
I’ve noticed Premier League teams have started using their own fonts in domestic cups as well. Liverpool did in the 2010/11 season, but not last season, whereas Chelsea wore their 80’s style 3D block fonts in the FA Cup, and Man City wore a generic Umbro font today.
Talking of today’s match I could tell the two teams apart without any problems. The shade of sky blue on Man City’s new home shirts is darker than previous seasons, but it wouldn’t surprise me if they wore the away kit against teams who wear white. The third shirt has been leaked and will be dark grey (of a blue-ish hue) and black stripes, with the logos rendered in sky blue.
Sorry Jon, I realise now that the mauve you’re on about is the goalkeeper, thought you meant the actual away shirt
There’s a Uefa font set, Jon? Which teams have worn that? Sounds interesting. Wasn’t aware one existed.
I’m totally in favour of clubs having their own fonts like in European competition and in La Liga but it annoys me when they’re not made up to suit a specific kit (set), from a design and marketing point of view.
This is it, Jay…
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/the-referee-massimo-busacca-shows-a-red-card-to-arsenals-news-photo/114261423
It’s used by Arsenal. Birmingham used it in the Europa League last season. And, I seem to remember Everton using it two or years ago.
Is that definitely a UEFA one Eric? Thought it was this? http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/robin-van-persie-of-arsenal-celebrates-scoring-from-the-news-photo/85042084
Arsenal have a new bespoke one this season anyway
That’s the old one, isn’t it?
I remember Celtic using it in 08-09.
Birmingham (Xtep) used the same one as Arsenal (Nike) in the Europa League last season, so I thought it must have been the standard UEFA one. Although there isn’t a UEFA logo on it, which is a little odd.
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/adam-rooney-of-birmingham-city-celebrates-scoring-the-news-photo/135853160
The Spurs font is used on the website, letterheads and on all THFC branded merchandise.
Yeah that’s a good joined-up approach Andrew, it’s a recognisable font without deviating too much from the norm.
Apparently its been confirmed that Arsenal have retained last season’s away strip as the third kit for the new season. Which puts it right up there with Liverpool’s “nightshade” kit as being one of the most superfluous!
Was it confirmed somewhere other than HFK?
I find it funny that Arsenal still have the reputation as being a team who really care and put a lot of thought into their kits…
As an Arsenal fan I find that absolutely hilarious, looking at this year’s monstrosities……..
It’s not just that though.
I mean other things, like causing clashes, having goalkeeper kits that clash with their outfield players, amongst other things…
You’re spot on Eric – as others have mentioned Nike have offered some poor kits and designs for a few years now (and not just for Arsenal). Hopefully the Arsenal return to Adidas rumour turns out to be correct…..
I’m pretty sure many Gooners fans would agree with me that a return to the yellow shirts blue shorts away strip would be extremely welcome!
Jon, every proper Arsenal fan would agree with every single syllable of that comment, well said.
Bit O/T, watching England/Italy…
Italy in Blue/White/blue
England in White/Red/white (Although the red shorts dont look as dark as i remember..)
GK in the foul turquoise shirt/shorts with white socks
Would it not have been better for the GK to wear the red shirt with the black shorts from the 3rd GK kit????
In reference to Jon’s comment (162) regarding Arsenal retaining last season’s away shirt as this year’s third and Denis asking if the info came from HFK, interesting to see that HFK have changed the 3rd shirt to the yellow used over the last two years.
Interesting Ronan, there’s a link to the 2012-13 Premier League Handbook on the official PL site, but it’s dead when you click on it
Matt, the England Home change shorts are a slightly lighter red than the goalkeeper shorts.
I’m not sure which black GK shorts you’re referring to. As I understand it, England currently have three goalkeeper kits: the all red, The purple and lime green and the turquoise (with white socks).
I thought the Italy shirt (and goalkeeper kit) was great, though I thought more of Schillaci and Zenga than Tardelli and Zoff.
Given that the differences are negligible, I don’t know why Italy didn’t just have that as their normal kit for 2012-14. Disappointed with the GK kit I must say, it should have been silver rather than grey, and needed black shorts and blue socks to finish it off.
I think the subtle changes made to the Italy shirt make it look more retro and way classier. Saying that I agree they should have used this kit in the Euros. This is obviously mainly a marketing ploy by Puma to sell more shirts.
http://www.premierleague.com/content/dam/premierleague/site-content/News/publications/handbooks/premier-league-handbook-2012-2013.pdf
Yellow is still Arsenal third
Surprised that Arsenal have opted to retain a kit for a third season, rather than market a new third strip for extra coin, now that is a shock.
Also surprised Stoke and Swansea haven’t got third kits when they’ll need them. Perhaps the same apply to Sunderland and West Brom too. Spurs’ third strip is a waste of time, I forsee a clash incident at West Brom for sure.
That’s good to see.
By the way, I don’t know why they don’t just ask John to illustrate the kits for the handbook. The one’s they have look awful.
Especially when there’s no consistency
Yeah!
I love the way some of the kits are just randomly at an angle!
To be fair the Premier League haven’t made the kit images themselves, they are provided by the clubs, who in turn had the images provided by their respective kit manufacturers.
Denis, I think it’s actually luck rather than judgement that made the one-off Italy kit superior to the actual design. Less is more and all that. 1982 of them were available so it’s there if you want it…
This has surely already been discussed at length but the reason why the GK socks weren’t blue was that they would clash with the outfield players. But what’s the difference between a goalkeeper and an outfield teammate from the waist down anyway? Do we need to differentiate? Surely the major factor is the top, in particular the sleeves. Do we know why the change was brought about?
And you’d think the rule could have been relaxed slightly for a friendly too.
Jon, I know that the makers provide the images but they’re not even consistent themselves, see Arsenal (I know that the yellow was from 2010). PL should have a template drawn and all clubs should fill it in, so to speak
Maybe I’m nitpicking but you would think they would have illustrations of the goalkeeper kits, rather than just “blue”.
Or, whatever wacky name they’ve given a colour. Like there is one goalkeeper kit called “forest”…
Spurs’ lack of a viable third kit shown up on the first day, wearing navy-white-white against Newcastle. If Newcastle had a black back rather than white then all-white would have been fine for Spurs
Whilst I agree that Tottenham should have had something like yellow as a third colour, just looking at some pictures from the match, I don’t think there was really a problem.
We never seem to agree on anything, do we Denis? 😛
By the way, does anybody have a picture of the Tottenham third kit? I haven’t seen it and can’t seem to find a picture of it on Google…
Pictures are totally different from seeing the game live or on TV Eric!
Funnily enough, since posting that I saw the game on Match of the Day and still didn’t have a problem with it.
In an unrelated note from Newcastle v Tottenham, it’s nice to see Gareth Bale switch to number 11. Much more appropriate these days.
Cech wearing the ‘forest’ kit today and Chelsea in all-black, not easy to differentiate.
Agree with Bale in 11 and VdV 10, just wish Arsenal would stop with Diaby 2, Sagna 3 and Santos 11
Another spotter’s badge is for the socks that Wigan are wearing right now – white with blue turnovers.
However in the club shop, Premier League handbook and on last season’s final home match, Wigan had blue socks with navy turnovers, with no “WAFC” inscription on them. Not the first time they’ve had some sock inconsistency since getting supplied by Mi-Fit, that’s for sure.
As for Spurs’ third kit, I found another leak here
http://soccer.indonewyork.com/tottenham-hotspurs-away-third-kit-season-2012-2013-leaked/
If the shirt was just grey, then fair enough, but the black stripes make it superfluous, and will cause an issue at West Brom for certain. I’m sure had Blackburn stayed up, this shirt would have possibly clashed with theirs too in the eyes of some officials.
Also agree with Denis on the differentiation thing with Čech’s kit, bit hard to see in dull light, perhaps he’d have been better off wearing the “slime yellow” strip that Chelsea have retained for a third season.
Still, better than his choice of kit the last time Chelsea played at Wigan on the opening day – charcoal grey, while his team mates wore black (one that the ref missed!).
Talking of refs, what about yesterday’s incident with Chris Foy (not to be confused with the Olympic cycling hero) being a right pedant about the colour of TAPE on James McClean’s socks. That is ridiculous!
If he was being REALLY pedantic he wouldn’t have allowed McClean on the pitch, as his shirt said ‘McLean’!
Howard Webb has joined in by ordering David Silva to do likewise after he had white tape on his socks, which then got covered up with light blue tape. For the ultra pedants out there, the shade of blue wasn’t the same. Also, Joe Hart is wearing white tape by the looks of it over his green socks, but hasn’t been ordered off. Suppose its one rule for goalkeepers………
A truly ridiculous “directive” from FIFA, probably from the same guy who wanted to outlaw striped shirts just so the number could be “more visible”.
It reminds me of the time when FIFA tried to outlaw untucked shirts in the 1990 World Cup, telling referees to issue bookings for such misdemeanours. Thankfully common sense prevailed.
To be fair, a lot of players were using so much of the white tape, that it looked like they were wearing white socks. Which can cause a problem if the opposition are actually wearing white socks.
Instead of calling FIFA and the Officials pedants why not query the prima donna’s who insist on wearing white ankle socks tO show off, can’t think of any other reason why they’d wear them.
Don’t they wear ankle socks to help their feet fit the boots better?
It does look ugly though…
I’m sure that ankle socks can be bought in colours other than white, make it a rule like the undershirts and cycling shorts
apparently a lot of players cut the boot part of their football sock then wear a white normal pair of socks and then tape them together.
Yeah, I heard Cristiano Ronaldo did that at Manchester United, Scott.
#195 Then they can wear the ankle sock underneath.
I also wish to state how wrong it is to see Southampton in all red. #SaintsInStripes
Just looked at the Premier Lge Handbook, Fulham’s third kit will be all Black with a White/Gold sash. Newcastle’s third kit is Lime green shirts and Navy shorts. Arsenal are supposedly keepeing the Yellow/Claret 2010/11 away kit for a further year as a third strip.
Agreed re Southampton, it’s just not on
Yeah, I don’t like the all red Southampton either.
Although, according to the commentator in the Man City v Southampton match, it has gone down really well with the supporters.
By the way, did anybody else find it odd that Portsmouth didn’t have the Jobsite branding on their shirts for the Capital One Cup match against Plymouth.
But it was back for the first league game of the season against Bournemouth a few days later.
Strange.
Well I would say that it’s because they’ve decided to have separate deals for the cup competition and the league and have yet to sort the former, but it would imply financial nous.
Anyone notice the new number 8 for Man U yesterday? “ANDESRON”
Not as bad as “BECKAM” a full 15 years ago mind…..
RE Pompey. Glad to see us on a post relating to Prem 🙂
Firstly, All kits will be changing. Someone said above we would carry over, we arent.
Also we had no sponsor on our shirts for Plymouth as we had no sponsor at all at that point! Jobsite contract ran out at the end of last season. All preseason friendlies used kits from 10/11 seaon that had Jobsite already on them. Jobsite resigned as sponsor a day or 2 after the Plymouth game, days or so before the first league game.
New away shirt was used tonight v Colchester. Its an interesting orange affair.
Yeah, United are serial offenders http://ow.ly/1OrYUv
Have just sent John an article about clashes, I’ve no doubt Eric will disagree with a lot of it!
Haha!
Looking forward to reading it, Denis.
After the first weekend of Premiership action, I can now form a more complete opinion…Arsenal home is best Nike kit by far – navy trim is really classy; Villa/West Ham are both like mid 90’s Pony kits – very old fashioned; Fulham home I like – but not sure the pinstripes really work; Chelsea black and yellow third I still think is gorgeous, as is Swansea away; Spurs I wasn’t sure about until you see it in the flesh – the silver grey trim does work, but it should have navy home shorts; West Brom/Sunderland/Stoke nice but a bit ‘templatey’; Newcastle home I think would have worked better with reversed colours – too much white on the shirt; Liverpool still HIDEOUS – nothing works for me on that home shirt at all; Norwich like West Ham/Villa looks a bit dated – last seasons was nicer; Man City home would be more balanced if it had black on the shorts, but why not use navy as a second colour?; Man Utd is an experiment too far – gingham is a pattern, like burbery, plaid etc, that should NEVER be used on football kits; Everton is nice but the ‘armbands’ just look naff; Southampton is not bad but not traditional enough for me; Reading home is really nice – love the red shoulder flash; QPR quite classy but can they start using the old ‘initials’ club crest again please? Think thats it, apologies if I’ve missed anyone!
The United ‘gingham’ shirt looked like a tabletop from a backstreet cafe on monday,the sweat gave it a sheen that looked plastic and shiny!! Whats the purpose of those ‘T’s on the shoulder too?
Anyone watching Malaga-Panathinaikos? Pana keeper is wearing a greenish-grey shirt and the outfielders are in the usual dark green, very hard to tell apart from a distance.
The Panathinikos GK choice is a shocker, very bad clash when at a glance, also would have thought Malaga would have been worthy of a bespoke kit from Nike
Martin Ping I have to vehemently disagree with you about the Liverpool home shirt, in my view it isn’t just the best kit in the Prem this season, but the best for years. They could only have bettered it with a white V neck (I suspect that tweak to appear next time they change the kit). As for the Navy bands on the Arsenal kit, I think they are naff and pointless. About the only thing I agree with you is that Tottenham should have Navy shorts (white for Europe)
Recently I bought the book Football Manager Stole My Life and, rather predictably, it resulted in my downloading the 2012 version, so my hours are going to be taken up with it.
The data editor had some kit options though, with the possibility of including change shorts and socks, as well as making changes for different competitions!
Andrew,
My biggest objection to the Liverpool shirt is with just a little more thought it could have been so much more – the material looks like a polo shirt, the ribbing likewise, and despite intending to evoke their 70’s/80’s heyday, the yellow logos just make the whole thing look unbalanced and cheap. But this is the whole point of a football strip forum – we aren’t all going to like the same thing! Just my opinion, no offence meant. Warrior I think have just come up with three strips without too much thought…should have been plain red shirt with white V-neck, white sponsors logo but other logo’s in yellow (a la early 80’s Umbro), plain red shorts and socks with single white stripe down the side of the shorts, with the away a simple white/black/white combo and the third all yellow..I’m sure LFC fans would have preferred that?
In reference to Denis and Football Manager, if only Fifa creation centre had the same facility for change kit elements and different compositions!
Well I was right about Liverpool’s kits causing a problem tonight. Hearts are wearing white at home, with Liverpool in black, which is apparently registered as their third strip in European competition.
Just beat me to it Jon, exactly what I was going to say!
Martyn I agree with almost all of your assessments, especially that of the new Liverpool home shirt – like City’s away shirt of last season, having the sponsor trim in yellow/gold really distorts the balance of the shirt – both kits I feel would be better with white sponsors to offset the colour of the manufacturer’s logo. And as you say, the Liverpool shirt would look much better with a white v-neck.
Massive fan of the new Arsenal home kit – was a huge fan of the previous two, but this is great too. Love the navy trim – reminds of the 90s, and looks so smart on the collar.
My only qualm is as with those kits mentioned – why not red socks? When are Arsenal going to return to red, for the most part of their history the most traditional colour? The 10-11 and 11-12 kits looked, so, so much better when worn with red. Oh well.
Still, Gunners fans can be happy that this strip will have a two-year lifespan – if only all clubs adopted this policy. We can but dream.
I’m watching Barcelona v Real Madrid on Sky+, as I couldn’t watch it live.
Am I the only one who thinks the new Barcelona goalkeeper kit clashes with the outfield kit?
Arsenal home shirt has really grown on me. Hated it at first.
Aston villas home shirt has too much going on with the collar and the shors look naf.
Chelseas home and away are pretty good if nothing special. Third is horrendous.
Evertons home just doesnt look right with the armbands. Overall it is a cheap looking shirt.
Fulham kappa kits re meh.
Liverpools home kit s not bad but agree with the comments that there is too much yellow on it.
Man ctys kits are class. Best of the bunch in my opinion.
Man Utd . Big fan of the home kit, in the minority I know . Away kit looks great too but heads up I picked it up without tryin it on and the collar feels reallyuncomfortable
Spurs kits look pretty good but would have to say after seeing them i person they look really cheap.
Not much to say about all the generic adidas kits. Very uninspired and lazy.
And other crap looking Puma Newcastle shirt. They havte y et to make a decent looking shirt for them when compared to the Italyand African nations cup kits.
Is that the navy fading into light blue, Eric? I agree with you (for once!)
That’s the one, Denis.
John may aswell close the comments section down, if we start agreeing with each other! 😛
Re Barca v. Real Madrid. Barca always had really nice classy looking tradititional shirts until the last three or four. It now seems to be a case of what can we do next instead of traditional stripes to make them look as tacky as possible. The new Real Madrid shirt on the other hand is plain yet different to previous offerings. Having said that I always preferred Madrid kits with purple trim as was the case in the Hummel and Kelme kit days.
Mark,
I don’t know what has gone on with Barca/Nike either – nothing wrong with tweaking the width of the stripes slightly, or adding a third colour (navy or yellow are the most common), but last seasons was horrible, and just didn’t say ‘Barca’ to me, and this seasons is an experiment too far – like TV interference!
I like the Real kit – navy as trim with subtle hints of sky blue works well – but purple would make a nice change.
Have you seen the new Bundesliga kits? Some interesting kits there – as a fan of FC Bayern I love our new away shirt – wasn’t sure about the flourescent orange/red trim at first but it looks really fresh and they’ve used it loads in pre season.
Martyn, the Black/Grey third kit is the pick of the bunch for me in this years Bayern wardrobe. Having had a quick look at other Bundesliga offerings i’m really impressed by Hannover’s offerings especially the third kit.
Sorry to go off topic, but who produced the referee kits before Umbro?
I was looking for a picture of something and stumbled upon this picture, it’s from the Premier League in 2005/06, and I can’t work out the logo.
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/referee-uriah-rennie-in-action-during-the-barclays-news-photo/56268709
Fairly sure that’s not a manufacturer’s logo Eric, think it could be a Kick Racism Out one or something similar
Pretty sure Nike used to make referees kits but didn’t put the Swoosh on them because dour authority doesn’t really fit in with their all action marketing angle. So it could be one of theirs.
This season they are putting the Swoosh on (France, Holland…) but they’re doing the tonal thing where it’s the same colour as the shirt.
To sum up, I’m pretty sure Rennie’s wearing a Nike shirt in that pic.
Thanks Denis and Jay.
Mark (228),
In Germany you usually get really interesting offerings from smaller companies, plus the larger ones use templates that you don’t see in England. For example, a couple of years ago adidas used a template for 1.FC Nurnberg and Carl Zeiss Jena that had asymetric sleeve colours – the former’s away kit was white with one red and one black sleeve, the latters home was white with yellow and blue. As you say, Hannover have had some interesting kits, and this season is no exception. Going back to FCB, the third shirt is different because of the orange and silver trim – Liverpool fans have pointed out the similarity to adidas’ last away shirt for them, but that was trimmed with grey – ours is a real silver shade. Interesting that the only English team that adidas experiment on with trim seems to be Chelsea. Biggest UK contract I suppose – but they do seem to try different things there.
229-232:
Don’t think I’ve seen that ref kit before – My theory is that it is from a pre season tournament – judging by the sleeve logos maybe the Emirates Cup? You do sometimes get different ref kits for those, but they’re still done under the auspices of the EPL, hence the logo…bit of a mystery is why the manufacturers logo is not visible/covered up? template looks like a Nike one (like the TC ones used on the top bar of this home page), but as you say, is probably a ‘kick racism out’ logo on the chest. Another mystery is where Uriah’s breast pocket is?
…Had another look – can see the breast pocket now – I was wondering how he’d get on without one of those!
It is from a Premier League match, Martyn.
Here’s the description…
“MIDDLESBROUGH, UNITED KINGDOM – NOVEMBER 20: Referee Uriah Rennie in action during the Barclays Premiership match between Middlesbrough and Fulham on November 20, 2005 at The Riverside Stadium in Middlesbrough, England. (Photo by Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images)”
If you search for Uriah Rennie on Getty Images, you’ll see lots more picture of Rennie wearing different referee kits, with that logo.
@Martyn – The Bayern kit in and of itself is nice, but unsurprisingly (http://www.truecoloursfootballkits.com/articles/mix-and-mismatch) if it had normal red trim I’d think it perfect foor Bayern!
Eric, the kit Uriah Rennie is wearing is an official sports kit, they had the contract for the premier league and football league after nike and before umbro. They have ceased trading in the UK but still provide most of the refs kits in the US (although not MLS as they have adidas). The nike ref kit had two narrow white lines going doen the sleeves on the black kit, the lines were black on the coloured kit.
Thanks for that, Will.
Denis,
Granted, the trim colour on the new Bayern away isn’t traditional ‘Bayern’ red – adidas call it ‘infrared’, and the overall effect in the flesh is a bright orangey red – the problem here is that unlike the strips referred to in your article, Bayern are (unusually for one of Europes big clubs these days) alternating the issuing of new shirts, so they are using last season’s red and gold home this year. Plus, I can’t think of an instant of Bayern using change shorts with the home kit – they have the same level of integrity as Liverpool and Arsenal when it comes to that. I would imagine that if we are playing a red shirt/white short team adidas will either come up with a bespoke change pair for the away, or we’ll use the third…Where I am going with this is that I would think adidas are thinking of making the red in the home shirt a much brighter hue next season. Our nickname is ‘Die Roten’, but there is no hard or fast rule as to the shade of red – up until the mid 60’s it was almost claret, so we’ve come full circle! Still love it though, traditional or not!
Oh I know that Martyn, and as I say it’s a nice kit, I’d just prefer if the shade of red matched. Were change shorts/socks used on the 03-04 home kit, the Arsenal-style one (I realise they were not the away versions)?
Denis,
Don’t think so on that one, but the one that followed it (retro styled with no adidas trim whatsoever in its first year) had white shorts & socks so neccesitated a red change pair – in its second year adidas changed it to all red. I don’t think when they have red shorts they have ever used a change pair. Socks are a different matter – the hooped style home kit that followed the above had white socks with red trim and a reverse as backup, and the striped ‘110th anniversary’ shirt from a couple of years ago was worn with navy or red in its lifetime. Being a Bayern fan, and a fan of football kit design, we have a very complicated history when it comes to strips, with some one off combinations that would no doubt cause Jon some headaches if he did do a European TC!
West Brom wearing blue numbering and lettering with the red away kit is just daft!
On the subject of referees’ kits, just noticed this season’s PL offerings, nice and retro!
Did anyone see the highlights of Wycombe v Bristol Rovers? Both team were in home kits. Wycombe Sky Blue and Navy halves and Rovers in Royal and white quarters. I know Bristol R have a black away kit which was more of a clash but I’m sure normally the do not play each other in home kits.
I did Andrew!
I was going to mention it here but assumed nobody else would have seen it!
Spotted it yesterday too guys, couldn’t believe it as halves and quarters so similar, and navy/sky is basically a ramped-up version of blue/white
Also watching the Football League Show made me annoyed at how many teams who wear red, having orange goalkeeper kits.
Middlesborough being the prime example.
This annoys me so much more than it should….
Im surprised we didn’t use last year’s Green/Black classic kit for the game. We will have to see what we wear in the replay 🙁
Denis, I am with you on the referee kit offerings this season, however just wish the Black kit had a white collar!
To be honest Alexander I think the green/black would be more of a clash contrast wise. I foresee another issue in the reverse fixture as Wycombe’s away strip is all white. Agian not a terrible clash but I suspect other clubs will change from white against Rovers.
One other thing from the weekend – WBA wore red shorts and socks with their new away at White Hart Lane, did they think Spurs still had navy shorts?
Denis – I know – so strange when teams (the kitman?) do that.
Does anyone else find it ridiculous that Aston Villa’s socks are quite obviously a darker shade of sky blue than the sleeves on the shirt? Seem to recall similar last season when West Ham paired their away shorts and socks with the home shirt.
Macron, just bizarre.
Very slack, Nick. Back in the late 90s, O’Neills, who manufacture most of the teams’ kits in Gaelic football and hurling, made the sleeves from a different material to the rest of the jersey, look at this for example: http://www.sportsfile.com/id/022389/
I remember those jerseys very well Denis, I used to wear a Cavan jersey around North London (the only blue shirt you’ll see me in) and the body material fading after many washes but the sleeves keeping it’s colour, didn’t look great.
I wonder what their rationale was
My own thought at the time Denis was that on the body of the shirt, the badge, sponsor and the GAA logo were all on the (cotton) shirt in felt. These were the first jersey’s O’Neills were producing with county crests etc on the sleeve as part of the colour of the sleeve (is this making sense?) I’m no expert in things ‘textile’ but perhaps they didn’t have expertise to do this in cotton and had to use that awful material instead.
I’d imagine that was the case alright, jersey torsos far plainer then
Anyone watching the Spanish Supercup? Barcelona’s kit looks very dark, yet Casillas is wearing a black shirt and shorts
Yeah, Denis.
He wore the bright orange away goalkeeper kit in the first leg.
Although, I think that was actually because Valdes was wearing the navy blue/light blue in that game.
None of it really makes sense. But in a way it does!
Something else I’ve noticed this evening. Fraser Forster in goal for Celtic is in all black and so are the officials – bear in mind you have the ones now placed to the side of the goal (who do nothing..) and that seems more than odd that it’s allowed.
Yeah Ronan.
You do often see the officials wearing the same colour as a goalkeeper, which I am fine with, and I believe is accepted.
But, as you say, in matches with the extra official standing by the side of the goal – I don’t think it should be allowed either.
You’ll find officials in the premier league do not allow it, actually I think kitmen in the prem sort it out in advance so the officials know what shirt to bring.
Goalkeepers wearing the same colours as the officials?
With all due respect that’s nonsense. I’ve seen it a million times in Premier League matches.
By the way, what is it with Pinto, the Barcelona substitute goalkeeper, wearing a different goalkeeper kit on the bench, as to what Valdes is wearing?
Valdes is wearing the green goalkeeper kit tonight, and Pinto is wearing red on the bench.
This also means that Barcelona have at least four (!) goalkeeper kits this season. Navy blue/light blue, grey, green, and red.
Goalkeepers wearing same as officials hardly ever happens in PL now Eric, really clamped down in past few years
Just from last weekend you had Stoke v Arsenal, with the Stoke goalkeeper in light blue, and the officials in light blue.
Tottenham v West Brom had the Tottenham goalkeeper in light blue, and the officials in light blue.
The officials were in green!
That isn’t green!
Well it’s certainly not the same colour as the Stoke or Spurs goalkeepers http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/lee-mason-the-referee-looks-on-during-the-barclays-premier-news-photo/150805754
It was considered green when it was introduced for officials in 1992-93, I can’t see what would have changed
That’s green and no mistake………
I believe Umbro call it Jade
Whether it is green, light blue, or jade.
You have to agree that you wouldn’t see two teams playing each other wearing those kits.
So, match officials kits do clash with goalkeepers in the Premier League! 😛
What? Lost. Weren’t the ‘keepers in light blue?
http://bit.ly/QE5SvV
I believe that in current academy football, if the home team is wearing any black kit (Player or GK) they must supply a kit for the referee.. if not (and the away team are) they the away team should fetch a referee kit… strange isnt it!
Seriously though, you do see a lot of goalkeepers and match officials wearing the same colour in the Premier League.
I’m going to keep an extra close eye on this at the weekend!
It does happen, but only if its unavoidable
The Umbro Diamond kit, available from A&H International, comes in 4 colours – Black, Green (Jade), Red & Yellow. So when Liverpool play Norwich at Anfield there may be a clash with the ref in Reina wears Green and Ruddy wears Black.
I’m watching Barcelona v Valencia, and Valdes is wearing the green goalkeeper kit, instead of the navy blue/light blue home kit.
I wonder if they noticed that the navy blue/light blue actually clashes with the outfield kit…
Some odd clashes in the Championship this weekend. The ref at Millwall wore black which in my view clashed with the home teams Navy (he could have worn yellow as neither keeper did) and Bolton’s Adam Bogdan wore Orange GK kit away at Hull. Surely that’s not on?
Yeah, Andrew, that’s another problem with Warrior in that we’re only aware of two goalkeeper kits as things stand. With other manufacturers you’re confident they’ve got another just in case. With Warrior, less so.
Usually it takes at least half an hour for me to prove myself wrong http://ow.ly/1OtX8j
Orange is a silly choice for a Liverpool goalkeeper kit.
I remember them having a red goalkeeper kit in 2007 aswell.
Stupid.
Did they Eric? Can’t recall that one
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/pepe-reina-of-liverpool-celebrates-his-teams-first-goal-news-photo/78133986
That’s not red…
Sorry Denis, just realised I made a mistake.
When I said “I remember them having a red goalkeeper kit in 2007 aswell” – I meant to type “I remember them having an orange goalkeeper kit in 2007 aswell”
I blame not having any coffee this morning…
That one in 06-07 was more old gold in my view, zero clash. David Seaman had orange in 96-97, 97-98 and 98-99 too and there didnt appear to be any confusion.
Maybe you’re right, Denis, I don’t know.
Even if it is gold, to be honest, and I know I’m probably the only one, but I have never liked teams wearing red against Wolves either – but that has always been accepted within the game.
Although, maybe I have a friend in Alex Ferguson, from that game at Molinuex a couple of years ago!
Arsenal wore navy at Wolves in 09, but I don’t see any clash there – I would against Blackpool but I think the two clubs (Blackpool and Wolves) have very different colours
Re. GK kits – here’s one for everyone: Bayern’s home GK shirt is lime green and black (contrasting with the red home), but the away GK is red…now surely if Bayern are wearing their away shirt, then they would be playing a team in red, meaning that the GK shirt would clash with the opposition? They couldn’t wear it with the home shirt, meaning that it’s only use would be for European games where they might be wearing the third shirt when they don’t clash with the opposition (ie. last year they wore the black third away at Napoli).
Really, Martyn? That is very odd.
I know that David Seaman wore red against Blackburn in 1992-93 when Arsenal wore their away, but I can’t think of too many other examples of a goalkeeper wearing his club’s home colour, bar of course when French ones do it in the Champions League
Leeds currently have a white goalkeeper kit.
I saw Paddy Kenny wearing it against Peterborough the other week, when Leeds turned up in the black third kit.
Yes, it is a bit strange. adidas are marketing it as a ‘Limited Edition’, and it is a near replica of the club’s home kit from the 70’s – red with chunky white collar and cuffs…but a very strange choice nonetheless.
Just had a look, it’s wasted as a GK kit, very like the 2000-01 CL strip!
Oliver Kahn used to wear red (with blue) gk kits back when he was in his prime didn’t he? Sure the reverse of the one he wore in the CL Final shootout win over Valencia was red.
It’d be good to see a picture of the one you’re referring to, Martyn/Denis.
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/manuel-neuer-goalkeeper-of-muenchen-gestures-during-the-news-photo/150245090
Kahn wore this in 01-20 http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/rotterdam-feyenoord-rotterdam-fc-bayern-muenchen-2-2-news-photo/52717897
Though I think that’s probably orange
And this in 1998-99 http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/torwart-oliver-kahn-news-photo/52942045, though Bayern had a navy home kit that season
Think that one’s red too. Yeah, found the current one and it is very nice.
Sorry, I linked to it but comment awaiting moderation, the orange is referring to 01-02 kit
Yes, as previously stated, Bayern had a navy home kit when Olly Kahn wore the red GK strip – the away during that period was either white with red stripes and navy trim or a horizontal twist on the same theme, and the third was the grey and red design as worn when we were robbed of the European cup in ’99, so a red GK kit wouldn’t really clash with any of those.
Sorry to go off topic (again!) but I was just reading some older posts.
Denis, you said that you can change the kits in Football Manager. I never knew this. To what extent can you alter the kits?
There is a data editor Eric which allows complete editing of kits, loads of styles available and the option for alternative shorts/socks and different kits for different competitions.
Just wish I’d explored it more before starting my game with Cork City!
Also, three goalkeeper kits too, so very comprehensive
Can you change kit manufacturers and sponsors?
Also, are the kits available generic designs, or from actual manufacturers?
Oh no, the designs are generic but most are catered for, and they’re unsponsored, no brand names mentioned
Thanks, Denis.
I might have to give FM13 a go now, haven’t played it for a couple of years…
Only if you want to become far less sociable!
@305/306… You can design your own kits with any manufacturers/sponsors and import them into the game.
regarding goalkeeper kits i am sure i have seen Buffon of Juve wearing the home kit as a keeper shirt. i think Juve had a salmon pink away kit which they were wearing at the time(early 2000’s) and whoever Juve were playing he was wearing that.
Yeah, I think he may have even kept it on for the following year too. Don’t quote me on that though.
Is the Portsmouth away kit, the same black with blue one that they had last season?
I can’t tell from the picture on Wikipedia, and they aren’t selling any of the new kits in the Portsmouth online store.
They released a new orange third kit for the new season, which they have used. Just seems odd that the black kit is still the away, if it is the same one as last season.
Bit O/T – Hartlepool’s new Away Kit (http://www.football-shirts.co.uk/fans/hartlepool-united-away-shirt-1213_17084) is all navy…
Bit strange seeing as their home kit is blue/white stripes and blue shorts/socks (albeit royal blue)… Surely they’d not be allowed to wear that if their home kit clashed (Or is Royal/Navy not a clash?)
Yeah, it is a silly choice, Matt.
Royal blue against navy blue is generally considered a clash. Last season, any team who played in royal blue and went to the Den to play Millwall (who wear navy blue) – wore a change kit.
Eric, actually I just remembered that in 1992-93, when PL refs began wearing green, goalkeepers were forced to change, with the exception of Peter Schmeichel for some reason
Bit Lazy of Warrior not to give Liverpool grey away change socks, isn’t it? I know that there is red on the shirts, but red socks still look out of place.
Agree with that Denis.The red socks dont suit them at all against a team like sunderland.Stranger still I find is that Sunderland are wearing Black shorts/socks which would be better on Liverpool.
Did Leeds wear their blue away kit at Cardiff to wind the ‘Bluebirds’ up? Paddy Kenny even wore White!
Ciaran, Denis, I was thinking about that myself. Sunderland were wearing their first choice kit and I have no problem with Liverpool wearing black shorts but the socks are an odd one (gr?).
Firstly, as you say, it’s technically not necessarily mismatching as the red and gold/yellow are used throughout – though this season’s kits are obviously not designed to be interchangeable – and I probably would have ended up loving it if the game had been won convincingly and memorably by Liverpool. However, the fact is it’s more evidence that Warrior have treated Liverpool’s kits with a lack of care and forethought.
Andrew, ordinarily there might be some doubt, but throw Neil Warnock into the equation…
Wouldn’t grey change socks for Liverpool have still clashed with Sunderland’s black socks?
It’s not ideal, but if I were Warrior I would have given them a simple white pair.
Why didn’t they wear the third kit? It’s shocking, but offered contrast to Sunderlands strip.
Not having that. Not having that at all. It had white sleeves.
and Sunderland have red sleeves, your problem is what?
I think you’re best going with a solid shirt v a striped shirt, and the white shorts when there’s so much white on the Sunderland shirt isn’t great either. Not necessarily a clash but just not better than black shirt and shorts. It may seem contradictory but for me the solid colour of black against red/white-black is easier to distinguish.
For peripheral vision, I think it’s better too if one team doesn’t have any white
Sorry, I’m talking out of my a*se aren’t I? The Liverpool Third has nightshade shorts, right? I imagined the white ones. But I stand by opinion regarding the shirt – the black works better.
Having worn all-red at White Hart Lane, West Brom wore their normal away against Fulham
What annoys me more Denis is the blue numbering and lettering that West Brom use on that kit. You can’t see it!
Was thinking the same, no excuse for not having white
I don’t think grey is a good choice for the Newcastle goalkeeper strip.
Fellaini just had a goal disallowed even though a defender’s trailing leg was playing him on. The exact reason why teams have to have different-coloured socks, but not caught.
Manchester United always change socks when away to a team with blue socks, is black and black enough of a contrast in such a situation?
I don’t want to be pedantic, but isn’t the reason why teams have different colour socks because it is football, and often players are looking down at the ball on the floor at a players feet?
Unless Stoke are playing West Ham, of course 😛
You are being pedantic, Eric.
As for Man United, they aren’t changing socks because the opposition are wearing blue socks. They are doing it for the Ferguson fetish! As I’m sure you know, Denis.
It’s just that it’s only more obvious when playing teams in blue, as not many teams have red socks, but not a red shirt (which means Man United have to wear a change kit anyway) and obviously they can’t switch to white, if the opposition are wearing white socks, like many teams do. And not many teams wear black socks. And if they do, they usually have a red shirt.
Okay, my brain is starting to hurt.
I’m not really helping, am I? 😛
Watching the Everton-Newcastle game tonight I was surprised that Newcastle didnt switch to their away shirts.
Although it worked well enough under lights it must be said.
Arsenal wearing red socks on Sunday http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/45047/manchester-city-v-arsenal-kit-selection?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+arsenal-news+%28News+Feed%29
Should be in red socks every time they wear the home kit….
They don’t need to change away to City, Sky v White should be OK. Though I agree Red socks are more traditional.
Why haven’t Arsenal opted for red socks as their first choice in recent years? Each of the last five strips has looked so much better for having them, particularly the 10-11 home strip.
Hopefully they’ll return to this tradition in two years with the next home strip.
I don’t think Wenger likes them, Nick.
Last season the official home socks were red, but were only used away from home in the event of a clash.
Also, interesting to see Malaga wearing their away kit at to Zenit (who turned up in all light-blue) last night. You don’t see many kit mix ups in the Champions League normally.
Does Joe Hart have another variation of his green kit to wear with City’s third strip?
In April Spurs play at Stamford Bridge, as normal they will switch to navy socks to avaoid a clash but my question is will they change shorts too? Usually they wear Navy but this years kit has white shorts. In my opinion I hate the white shirts, white shorts and dark socks look, it looks unbalanced. Anyone else care?
They’ve often wore white-white-navy at the Bridge though haven’t they? Even though I think Jon said Chelsea haven’t wore blue on white since about 1987
Interesting to see the match officials wearing different kits in the Champions League and in the Europa League this season. Adidas usually just give out one set, don’t they?
Like the one’s used in La Liga and the SPL are usually the same for Europe.
The Champions League kits are nice, but the Europa League kits are… wacky.
Lazio must be well chuffed seeing the Officials decked out in Roma colours……
haha!
I wonder if that is the first choice kit, as it is the same colours as the Europa League branding.
Agreed, the EL ones are awful, though the CL refs have had different kits to the rest for the past two seasons at least
Are you sure Denis?
Andrew, I think Spurs will change just their socks – although I’m simply using the last time they sported an all-white kit as a guide, as this picture indicates:http://www.gettyimages.com.au/detail/news-photo/nicolas-anelka-of-chelsea-shoots-at-goal-as-michael-dawson-news-photo/78913816
And on Spurs’ strips: for those who’ve seen them in the flesh, do you agree with me in saying that they look cheap? I’m not a big fan of all the unnecessary design flourishes on the away in particular, very dated.
What I dislike most about the Spurs kits, after the white shorts obviously, is that the trim on the home is beige rather than navy
Is it? I thought it was a metallic grey effect?
It is definately not beige. Silver/Grey/Metallic call it what you like.
It looks beige in some lights but that’s a moot point, it’s not navy and it should be
Great neat uncomplicated Wigan designs, however can’t see the real need for three kits.
Spurs trim: Silver – looks better in the flesh than on TV. Despite the third being superfluous, it’s really nice – yellow trim at least HINTS at classic Spurs kits of old. Really like Fulham’s away, unusual colour choice for them, but it works, and their third, which I saw for the first time here, is stunning (though I’m not sure where the green comes from). Best Man City kit is the third – when it was unveiled I thought ‘oh great, trying too hard again’, but I like it. Best Prem sets IMO still Chelsea and Swansea (if you count last season’s SCFC black effort being this seasons third). And I’m sorry, I still think that Liverpool’s three are the WORST combination of strips in the history of the Premiership…
Both goalkeepers at the Emirates wearing dark green
Um, was about to complain about Liverpool “inexplicably” (explanation: it needs to sell) wearing the Third kit at Norwich but…
It actually looks alright on tv, which I suspected it might, but it doesn’t look like Liverpool one bit.
And, no, that has nothing to do with the scoreline.
Officials in red. That’s definitely not the reason.
I would just like to apologise to Andrew, and to a lesser extent Denis, for the the whole “match officials wearing the same colour as goalkeepers in the Premier League” thing.
I was wrong. I’ve kept a close eye on it the past few weeks, and I got it wrong.
I’m mainly apologising for calling Andrew’s comment “nonsense”. Sorry Andrew.
Sorry to go off subject (and return to my pet subject) but Bayern Munchen were away at Werder Bremen today and unveiled a dedicated pair of change shorts to go with the away shirt (yes I know that red doesn’t strictly speaking clash with green but they ARE both dark-ish strips neccessitating the change)…They are flourescent orange/red (matching the trim on the shirt) – looks classy when you see the whole outfit, and should please the contributors to this site who complain about teams wearing the same coloured shorts. ALSO – Haven’t seen the highlights yet but I would guess that Neuer had the all red GK strip on (much lighter shade than the outfield red meaning no clash).
Yeah, love those Bayern Away change shorts. On the same subject, Swansea wore black (with gold) change shorts and socks but, whilst being very nice, didn’t quite avoid an overall clash with Stoke, in my opinion.
No Worries Eric. Clash of the day for me was at Bramall Lane. Notts County in Pink against Sheffield Utd just does not offer any contrast. Surely their Gold/Orange and Navy hoops would have been better?
Even the home kit would have been better than the pink one.
By the way, has anyone noticed the three goalkeeper kits that Adidas have given to most of their clubs this season?
Here’s a picture – http://i.imgur.com/yhFaI.png
They could have offered a bit more variation. I mean, God knows what an Adidas team who play in blue are supposed to do when they face a team like Wolves.
The Liverpool 3rd kit seems to look a lot darker on the field. I was listening to the Norwich game on the radio and they described the Liverpool kit as black. Then on Match of the Day they had black as Liverpool’s colour when they were going through the starting line-ups. So, in effect,Liverpool have two black kits this season!
Just noticed that Arsenal are away to West Ham next Saturday, will they be allowed to wear the away or will we see the yellow third?
Had the same conversation last night whilst enjoying several pints with the Arsenal Tralee Supporters lads who were in town for yesterdays game. As far as I can see both shirts clash with West Ham, as you know we’ve worn red at Upton (and Villa) Park before and it looked wrong. Common sense says wear the yellow but common sense didn’t prevail at Blackpool the season before last….
Great minds Ronan, did the Kerry lads agree?!
They did of course Denis! Sensible people from ‘The Kingdom’ (have to say that as I’m married to a Kerrywoman!!)
In person the Liverpool Third does look like a dark navy. It would be good to see the Arsenal “Third” for a third season. But will they revert back to the crest from 2010-11 or keep the one from last season? I have the feeling it’ll be the latter as all the original stock will be gone.
PL Handbook has it as it was in 2010-11
Well good for Arsenal/Nike if that’s the case. I now, however, have a feeling that the 2011-12 handbook had the Third kit crest as it was in ’10-11 too. You able to check that?
Personally I think the away kit is dark enough to be a contrast to West Ham’s.
@Jay – in 2011-12 the handbook had the anniversary crest on the third kit.
Good ol’ handbook! Never in doubt. Saturday will be interesting.
I don’t think there will be a problem with Arsenal wearing the new away kit at Upton Park.
By the way, Iker Cassillas wore the green outfield third kit against Deportivo tonight. Iker has worn outfield kits in the past, in the event of a clash. But tonight there was no reason why he didn’t just wear the bright pink, or black goalkeeper kit.
Claret v black is not often allowed, for example in 2007-08 Manchester United wore the previous season’s white away when they went to Villa Park while Liverpool did the same in 2002-03.
Both Arsenal and Manchester City wore navy at Villa Park last season and both instances caused confusion
Man United wore the black away kit at Villa Park in 07-08, Denis. They did switch to white for the FA Cup match with Villa a few months later though.
I did post the pics, but I think they were eaten by the spam filter…
League match – http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/nani-of-manchester-united-clashes-with-martin-laursen-of-news-photo/77427552
FA Cup match – http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/ji-sung-park-of-manchester-united-clashes-with-stiliyan-news-photo/78787990
Only missing Tottenham’s third and a couple of last season’s away strips that this year are used as third strips! (Arsenal 3rd, Man Utd, Reading, Southampton)
Only just seeing highlights of Villa v West Brom for first time – both in white shorts and sky blue socks against white, which Arsenal considered enough of a clash to change from last week.
Why didn’t WBA wear navy shorts and socks?
It seems that some clubs just aren’t that bothered about clashes!
I thought the same thing about Villa v West Brom.
Anyway, maybe it’s just me but I always think West Brom look better with navy socks.
With striped shirts like that, I’d be in favour of same shorts and socks, with dark shots and socks then preferred above white shorts/dark socks.
I think a lot has to do with the most predominant Albion kit in my mind from childhood is the 1999-2001 kit.
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/lee-hughes-of-west-bromwich-albion-holds-off-otto-bragstad-news-photo/1065296
On Match of the Day 3, they go through and review all of the kits in the Premier League this season!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/19780609
Go to 11:58 for the kit talk with Pat Nevin and Steven Reid.
That was fun viewing! So many times I wanted to hurl my iPhone out of the window though, and also several moments that demonstrated surprising astuteness.
The manufacturer that Pat Nevin refers to, in case you haven’t worked it out, is Xara.
Full of errors, that clip, but entertaining all the same.
Maybe I am showing my age here but West Brom in wide stripes with white shorts and socks are best.
http://www.whoateallthepies.tv/kits/50305/my-favourite-kit-west-bromwich-albion-1977-81.html/attachment/soccer-football-league-division-one-west-bromwich-albion-v-manchester-city
Though the often had alternative navy shorts and socks, which was rare in the late 70’s/ early 80’s
It was mentioned on this site that Manchester United would never wear all-red when shorts clashed due to the all-red connection with a certain team from Merseyside. Now, I’m not the youngest bloke to contribute to this site but I cannot remember the last time I saw them in all-white. Very similar to their old buddies from Yorkshire, nice of them……
Man United used to wear all white on almost every visit to Anfield, Ronan.
It was something Gary Neville wanted, for some reason. Since he left, they seem to have stopped doing it.
Looking at HFK, it’s much more recent than I thought. They’ve worn all-white very recently, but to me it looks wrong!
By the way, if anybody here is on Twitter and isn’t following this guy, you’re mental!
http://twitter.com/kitnerd
Barcelona wore their home kit away to Benfica tonight, which I think is fine.
Although, I’m sure they switched to the orange and yellow away kit when they played a team in red in La Liga a few weeks ago.
Arsenal wore the away in an U21 game away to West Ham recently: http://www.whufc.com/page/TV/OtherHighlightsDetail/0,,12562~2928792,00.html
Can’t view video (any Hammers here who can?!) but from the still teams can be differentiated although some refs are more picky than others.
Yeah, could be argued that the sleeves and shorts help dodge the overall clash. Socks may be an issue for some.
Agreed with that 100% Jay. But after having a close-up look at the shirt in the club shop before the game tonight I can really see a Ref not allowing it to be worn at the weekend.
I wonder what Bordeaux will wear tonight at Newcastle?
Or rather, what will Newcastle wear? I have a feeling they’ll be wearing the glow-in-the-dark lime green kit at home again, just as they did at home to Atromitos in the last round.
Bordeaux are a bit like Liverpool and a few others in that their third kit is entirely superfluous. Navy home kit, white away kit, and what appears to be a more purpley shade of navy for a third kit, complete with white Vee, and a PINK sash! Looks more like a Miss World pageant outfit!
Agreed Jon, that’s an awful shirt!
Jon, Denis, that shirt is sublime.
Sub – lime
1. Characterized by nobility; majestic.
2.
a. Of high spiritual, moral, or intellectual worth.
b. Not to be excelled; supreme.
3. Inspiring awe; impressive.
4. French for wierd!
I think Jay means that Newcastle’s is lime and Bordeaux’s is worse, i.e. sub lime.
Good call Jon btw
One final word on West Ham v Arsenal before I’m no doubt proven wrong: in 2009-10 Arsenal wore their white third rather than the navy away, which would have clashed less than the current one would
Looks like Arsenal are wearing the yellow….
I think the shorts are those made for last season, even though they weren’t actually worn before today
Yeah, reckon you’re bang on with the shorts. I think they may have had to manufacture new old shirts as I doubt the stock would’ve been kept until now (as I have a pretty good idea where it goes) but last season’s shorts – Home, Away or Third change – didn’t have the laurel and oak leaves so work ok. A hybrid kit, whatever next…
Didn’t watch the game but thinking…borderline overall clash? Arsenal didn’t wear those shorts all of last season but chose to wear them on a day they matched their opponents’ shirts? Should have worn the yellows I reckon.
When I turned it on, I did say that the yellow shorts would have been a better idea!
I thought that the claret shorts were first choice when it was unveiled? didn’t Arsenal wear the clarets until they went to Anfield? In a related note, Arsenal/Nike have changed the crest/sponsor to keep a kits lifespan going before (the unveiling of the new crest overlapped, as did changing from Sega to 02). Don’t think any problems were caused by the shorts though – without wishing to open a can of worms AGAIN, but Spurs rarely changed their shorts (when navy was first choice) when they played Everton. Surely the issue of shorts clashing with opposing shirts is irrelevant? Especially when a vivid yellow shirt (like Arsenal’s) is used. I know there are some exceptions, but I really don’t think its an issue (sorry). Moving on, Hoffenheim (all blue) played Bayern (all red) yesterday, yet turned up in their black away strip…confused?
So, you guys were right about Arsenal wearing yellow at Upton Park. Personally, I still think the away kit would have been okay.
Is that the first kit in the Premier League to be used in three season’s since the white Man United 2002-05 away kit?
The redcurrant are first choice Martyn, though Anfield was the first game of the 2010-11 season.
I don’t think it’s a problem in all cases about shorts clashing with opposition shirts, but I think that there can be issues with peripheral vision. In the comments on my article, John linked to a college study on this, with interesting results.
What Man Utd kit are you referring to Eric?
In any case, I just realised that the answer to your question is no, as the yellow kit was only worn against Milan last season
Actually, it was the 2003/04 and 2004/05 away kit, Denis. It was retained as a third kit for 2005/06.
I’ll post the photos. I’ll stagger them to avoid getting eaten by the spam filter.
In 03/04 at Anfield
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/sami-hyypia-of-liverpool-clashes-with-ruud-van-nistelrooy-news-photo/2711902
In 04/05 at Villa Park
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/john-oshea-of-manchester-united-tangles-with-carlton-cole-news-photo/51898830
In 05/06 against Lille
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/wayne-rooney-of-manchester-united-and-efstathios-tavlaridis-news-photo/56058581
05-06 wasn’t PL either 😉
Watching Real Madrid v Barcelona now, no way should the referee be wearing black
Damn you Denis! 😛
By the way, totally agree about the referee in El Clasico. I mentioned it to my Dad, who didn’t care at all!
Close-up it was distinguishable, but from the normal view it was very confusing.
At least Casillas didn’t wear the black goalkeeper kit this time, like he did in the Super Copa match at the Nou Camp.
Why is there such a big deal being made about Newcastle getting Wonga as a sponsor? Nothing was said when they sponsored Hearts or Blackpool
There was a lot of objection when Blackpool got Wonga as sponsor, maybe we never heard much about it given their lower profile compared to Newcastle. Having said that I think a lot of the objection to Wonga is down to people not understanding the market place in which they are operating. The ridicoulously high interest rates quoted by them are based on borrowing a loan over a minimum of 12 months (APR). This is the figure they are required to quote by law however loans offered by companies like Wonga are intended to be very short term.
Eric and Denis, of course the referee should be in black.
The referee should always be in black! Unless its a game involving the Scottish national side.
That may be Andrew, but I meant in the context of Sunday, where the existing situation was that one team had a mainly-navy kit
I noticed when Aaron Lennon came on as a substitute for England last night, he was wearing number 19.
Have they increased the number of subs for qualifiers? It used to be 7, numbered 12 to 18 – although I know some national teams use squad numbers.
Eric,
I believe that the official line is that they still have to name 23 players, given 1-23, but only 18 actually in the squad. But as you say, a lot of national teams persist with the numbers from the previous tournament. As a fan of German football, I know Germany do.
I’m not at all happy with this new development.
It’s an interesting one. Discussed the number 10 missing for Ireland against Germany with Denis yesterday. Both theories above could well apply, Denis would have to confirm (because I can’t be bothered). The thinking would be a Euro 2012 squad picked based around what the expected starting lineup would be, then for the next games the players from the Euros keep their numbers with those missing again being replaced based on expected starting lineup and, with Robbie Keane out, that resulted in the ten not appearing.
Never mind the “10” not appearing in that absolute shambles last night, I don’t think “1-9 & 11” put in much of an appearance either…..
Is that right? Hmmm. Is that based on the ‘keeper holding onto the number he had in the Euros? Was it Westwood?
To be honest, I watched HIGNFY so what happened may have flown under my radar.
Jay, Ronan is making a joke about the performance.
Martyn is right, as the Ireland numbers last night were different to the Kazakhstan game, which were in turn different from the European Championship.
Ah, sorry. I read the dash as a comma.
I just checked TheFA.com and England has eleven substitutes for the San Marino game!
http://www.thefa.com/England/News/match-centre/2012/england-v-san-marino
Just click on “team sheet”
Yeah, it was the same for Ireland according to UEFA.com and the TV graphics
doesn’t Australia have 2 squad’s?. one a european and the other “home” based. i say this as i’m sure i’ve seen them on tv with silly numbers like 57.
Denis is right Jay, I was making a joke about the performance as it was, well, a joke I suppose! Didn’t see HIGNFY myself but turned to Sky 1 to watch ‘Moone Boy’ and very good it was too! By the way noticed that we have another new kit. It’s ok but I’d love to see us go back to the circa 1978 O’Neills number.
Yeah, the joke wasn’t too subtle, Ronan, it was me being an idiot. Moone Boy was a good choice, as it’s set bang in between Euro ’88 and Italia ’90 isn’t it? A happier time for Irish football. Think he wears a Crown Paints Liverpool shirt (’87-88) in one episode, or certainly in publicity shots.
I’ve checked it and I’m sure it’s a reproduction. I don’t think adidas Originals ever did that one so it’s probably Score Draw or something. The sponsor’s too big – not to mention in too good condition – for it to be an adidas replica from the time.
Think you’re spot on with the Liverpool shirt Jay. Plenty of Liverpool fans around in Ireland back then (and of course a fair few today). Also correct to say that it was a better time for Irish football – they were wearing the Adidas shirt with the ‘mesh’ sleeve if I recall correctly. Met a bloke once wearing the away one that he said once belonged to Niall Quinn – it was about 8 sizes too big for him so he could have been telling the truth….
Well Jay, if they used a real replica from that time, it’d look too old in the show, wouldn’t it?
Was surprised that Friday’s final was set on June 25, 1990, the day Ireland beat Romania, but no mention of Italia 90
That would be a fair point, Denis, if I’d actually advocated using an original shirt rather than a reproduction. I don’t think it would have been a good idea, and I’ll tell you for why: if I saw a show had gone to the length of sourcing an original shirt I would have been in such awe that I might have missed some lines of dialogue.
Actually, I’ve seen a few of those shirts in mint condition – the kids’ ones aren’t that rare.
On that same theme, there’s a new Gerard Butler film – Playing For Keeps – where he plays an ex-Celtic and Liverpool player and there’s flashback footage of him wearing an ’89-91 Celtic Home shirt. It’s a sourced original but there’s a problem: it’s a replica so the sponsor’s far too small.
adidas Originals re-issued the 1985-6 Liverpool shirt (in 2009) with a different collar and different material than the original: http://www.melmorgansports.co.uk/shop/images/crown1.jpg
The 87-88 shirt was never re-issued.
Yeah, Denis and I were discussing how bad that one was just the other day. I saw someone at training with that on once and wasn’t even immediately sure of what it was trying to be.
I don’t understand how they managed to get the collar wrong, especially when the one they’ve chosen is more complicated than the original!
Amazing lack of attention to detail
Oh there must be method to the madness. It’s not difficult to replicate a kit. There must be some sort of benefit in the two being easily distinguishable, though what that is I have no idea.
Have heard the excuse that differentiation is required so that those with originals (as opposed to Originals) don’t lose out if they’re selling, but you could easily just put that on the tag
I don’t see why adidas would care about that, unless managers (designers twenty years ago?) have a stash of the originals ready to sell for their retirement. And the problem with just adding the label is that people will swap them. Some people buy old kids’ Umbro shirts for the diamond strip so they can make up men’s shirts to sell as original 70s/80s stuff, so I don’t think an exchanging of labels would be beyond them.
With England playing tonight, I was thinking about the upcoming switch from Umbro to Nike.
It’s obviously been a long time since England changed kit manufacturer, so I was just wondering about what they are going to do.
Do you think they will release a new home and away kit at the same time, and just release new kits every two years at the same time? Or will they go back to staggering the release dates, which will lead to a kit only lasting one year?
What do the good folk of this website think they will do?
What England match is that Eric?
wrt Nike- Hope England fans dont get their hopes up.The hype will be driven up tenfold before the world cup-more so than normal- with nike involved.
Assuming good old England qualify of course!
Joe Hart wearing Red Shirt and Navy shorts because the Referee wouldn’t change so he could wear his blue/green shirt.
Clash tastic….
Why couldn’t Hart wear all red? A keeper can have the same coloured shorts as the oppo for gods sake
What are the shorts? They’re not the outfield Away change because they have a full colour crest, if memory serves me correctly. My initial thought was that they were the “Galaxy” training shorts.
And the ref shouldn’t’ve been wearing dark shorts with a light blue top anyway. Back to the findings of that study again…
No issue, according to Eric!
Eric, the precedent that springs to mind regarding the England kits would be France. Nike took over the FFF contract in 2011, I think, immediately released two beautiful kits, then released two more beautiful kits for Euro 2012.
To sum up, England will have lots of beautiful kits.
What could the referee switch to anyway, to allow Hart to change?
They have four kits. Black, yellow, grey and light blue. Black would have clashed with England. Grey would have caused an issue with Poland. And the Poland keeper wore yellow.
Not that I have a problem with refs wearing the same colour as keepers.
Oh and I actually agree with Hart having to wear change shorts.
Sorry Eric, I should have been clearer, I meant you had no issue with the ref in light blue/black and England in dark blue/light blue
Oh yeah, I know Denis. I was actually talking about Matt’s post.
I decided to leave the overall clash thing. I, unsurprisingly, had no issue with it, but the thought did occur to me during the game that you and Jay would bring it up! haha!
I didn’t see the game – still celebrating the win over the Faroes – so I must decide later
What was the order I said for precedence on changing? Home outfield, away outfield, away goalkeeper, officials, home goalkeeper? That would have worked today. Officials would have worn yellow and the home ‘keeper would have had to find another top. If only there was a website that could tell us what options he would have…
…All blue then? Apparently this would have caused a shorts clash issue with England but, I’d argue, not necessarily an overall clash.
Hart in the aqua green kit, Polish GK in all-yellow, officials in grey. Simples.
The ref/England situation caused some confusion on the Football365 Forum:
http://imageshack.us/a/img132/1338/polveng.jpg
But using The Jayworth-29eris Method, Joe Hart would have first choice of gk kit, so could wear all red if he liked.
Do you not think the grey might have caused a problem with Poland’s white shirts, Denis?
It’s very light grey, almost silver.
By the way, if people want to start being picky about refs kits, maybe we should mention them wearing the same colour shorts and socks as teams….
Especially in games like this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EahV3oC2qf0
I remember that game, Denis.
Didn’t Arsenal turn up with the same kit again the following season, and Man United decided to change to white socks. Which, I guess isn’t too much of a problem, as they like to do that.
By the way, a sign of the kit changing world…
http://twitter.com/HullCityKits/status/258914042779947008
Even our Denis has got involved.
Also, I noticed from one of @hullcitykits tweets, that the ill thought out Adidas goalkeeper kits are causing a problem. Something which I mentioned on here a few weeks ago…
Yeah I thought of you when I saw that tweet Eric.
It was later that season that Arsenal also wore that at OT, but as it was the FA Cup Man Utd were wearing white socks anyway.
Not sure why Arsenal didn’t just wear white socks in the league, especially as white shorts and socks were worn with that shirt against Roma.
From 94-95 to 99-00 inclusive, as well as 01-02 and 02-03, Arsenal wore navy socks at OT but in 00-01 they changed to yellow
@457 – The shorts are from the England 3rd Gk Kit (They have one that the Mens team have never used but the u21’s downwards and ladies have.. think we had a pic on here somewhere)
@466/468 Poland do have a Green GK shirt (That design is available in Green/Yellow/Red/Black/White/Purple) which of those colours they could have worn green (which they used at Euro 2012 I think..) and put the Referee in Yellow (and therefore Joe Hart in the Light blue/green effort..)
A little known fact regarding the Man U Arsenal cup game that season……now we all know that Arsenal will either wear all short sleeves or all long sleeves (never a mix) except for that game. What happened was all the Arsenal team wore long sleeves in the first half but changed at half-time to short sleeves (haven’t got a clue why). Thierry Henry came on as a second-half sub but hadn’t changed his shirt at half time, so it’s the only time you’ll ever see a mix on the same pitch where Arsenal are concerned. Unless anyone out there knows different…….
Very interesting Ronan!
as far as i am aware the arsenal captain decides what sleeve length the team wears.
Yeah that’s the tradition Scott, back as far as Herbert Chapman’s days!
I’ve often wondered as to what happens when the goalkeeper is captain, does he canvass opinion from the rest or what?!
Just reading some old posts…
We missed a trick when talking about which kit Arsenal would wear at Upton Park, and whether if it is the yellow third kit, if it will have the anniversary badge, or not. When they turned at Upton Park with the new/old crest, somebody should have said…
“They’ve re-badged it you fool…”
I’m up too early, might go back to bed 😛
Matt (476), what shorts are those? The Home change gk kit, which I think you’re referring to, is purple (though it looks like navy) with apparently luminous lime green details. There’s no way those are the shorts. I’m sticking with them being the “galaxy” training shorts http://amzn.to/OQIo6c
There’s a whole load of colours for that Nike goalkeeper template but this site doesn’t give Poland the green version, certainly not in Euro 2012.
Good call, Eric. A missed opportunity there.
“I’m not wearing a three season old kit, I’m not wearing a three season old kit.”
Lovely stuff, Jay.
I presume this won’t set a trend? http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/10/18/he-scores-he-scores-again-cash-strapped-greek-soccer-team-takes-on-brothel-sponsorship/
Also, what are the views on Stoke’s away kit as a solution for games against teams in red, now that they have played at Old Trafford and Anfield?
Celtic wore their away at St Mirren today too, no real problems in my view http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/celtic-player-victor-wanyama-in-action-during-the-news-photo/154450635
I think the biggest issue I had with the United-Stoke game was United wearing white shorts with dark socks and Stoke the reverse, but it still didn’t really cause a problem. The Stoke shirt is predominantly blue and the continuation of that to the shorts was easily distinguishable from United’s red with white shorts.
Certainly no issue with the Celtic game, though the St Murn players who went with a black baselayer could’ve helped out by wearing a white one (the shirt’s sleeves are striped). I thought I saw a guy wearing a white one in the first half but it might have just been my stream confusing me.
Eric, Jay and I may need to get a room at the Linton Travel Tavern, Kit aficionados and Partridge fans too!
I like that Stoke’s socks weren’t just the home ones but alternative away ones.
Yes you’re right about that fact Ronan, as this photo confirms!: http://www.gettyimages.com.au/detail/news-photo/arsenal-players-celebrat-victory-after-the-fa-cup-fifth-news-photo/1798516
Oh, regarding Stoke (*takes deep breath*), I’ve thought about this long and hard and I reckon they had time to put together a green Third kit for the United game, in the wake of Alex Ferguson’s “jolly green giants” comments. It would, of course, have just been teamwear but they could have called the Premier League, got it cleared and printed up/had the crests affixed during the night.
It would’ve been a great response to the jibe and surely would have brought such a cheer from the fans that it would’ve acted as a shot in the arm. They might have then gone on to score first and… Oh.
Nice one Nick! Can’t believe that game was so long ago….
I know! Almost a decade since Fergie’s flying boot, and the days Giggs was booed by his own fans!
I thought the Stoke away kit was a stupid idea when I first saw it, but yeah, after seeing it at Anfield and Old Trafford, there isn’t really a problem at all.
Is it an anniversary kit, or something? And, have they retained a third kit?
Adam Bogdan, the Bolton goalkeeper, wore orange in the match with Wolves last night, who were in old gold obviously.
The mind boggles…
It boggles or bogdans? That’s one of the worst clashes I’ve seen involving a GK
Hello all. Wow, I’ve just spent far too much time reading every comment! Great discussion, with some fantastic points to peruse over. If I may go all the way back to the comments around the 190ish mark about socks and tape, does anyone have any opinions on boot colours? Maybe it’s just me but it’s something that bugs me, especially when it comes to officials insisting players ‘colour in’ the tape/wear the correct colour tape around the ankle but every boot colour under the sun is fine. I don’t believe there are any guidelines regarding boot colour whereas there are for socks. Personally I’d like to see black boots for all, but I doubt that will ever return! Should the boots match the sock colour or should a team all wear the same colour? Should tape colour matter in this context?I’m just interested in peoples opinions on this as I haven’t seen it discussed elsewhere – possibly because I’m the only one bothered by it!
I’ve never had a problem with boots and colours, to be honest. I’ve seen it mentioned on here before. Personally, I think it’s kit geeks having a bit of an existential moment really. Ha!
Karris, in my ‘career’ I have never worn anything but black boots, but unfortunately not everybody is as sensible as you and I!
I think for me it’s more about the lack of any decisions about the boots. I remember back in the 80’s when players started wearing cycling shorts under their shorts, now that didn’t bother me but was soon ‘regulated’ so that they had to match the shorts, the same as now with the long sleeved thingees they wear. Now of course we have the ankle tape having to be coloured in which I think is a bit silly if for example a player has red socks (v blue socks) and is wearing blue boots, wouldn’t the boots be more of a problem that a bit of white tape?
The ‘Arsenal to Adidas’ story seems to be gathering pace according to today’s ‘Daily Telegraph.’ anyone else heard anything? What about my fellow Gooner Denis??
Karris the issue isn’t strictly speaking tape, it’s the use of white ankle socks over coloured football socks that cause a clash with white stockinged teams. The tape generally isn’t used that excessively, though I suspect there were isolated incidents.
Usually, the ankle socks are not worn over the football socks – the foot of the football sock is cut off and then the rest of the football sock is taped on to the ankle sock.
The reason is that many players like to wear a particular kind of ankle sock with their boot.
But why can’t they wear them in a matching colour? It harks back to that Prima Dona Ponce Ronaldo wanting to show off and have his feet more visable. Tosser!
Just in case we needed reminding that Spurs’ third is one of the most superfluous in history, they wore it at Southampton today
Denis, while I agree that the Spurs 3rd is superfluous, don’t you think its a fantastic original design.
Original definitely, and black and silver always go well together, not really a fan of halves though
Agreed that the second kit would suffice but even so Denis I thought even a kit fanatic like yourself could appreciate that a newcomer like under armour needs to showcase its designs to a greater audience.
The first kit would have sufficed too! But that is a consideration too I suppose Ciarán
Your right about the home kit.was a gaa-heavy weekend so didnt see the game.Forgot the traditional design was gone from southampton (along with form too it seems!).was thinking back to the sunderland/bolton game last year which was a bad clash in my view.
Yeah that was bad as both had dark shorts too
Anyone see the London Irish-Harlequins game? No? You missed a cracker (probably. It caught my eye when I was watching the news – didn’t listen).
The reason I mention it is that if anyone still is of the opinion that the “overall clash” is just some fantastical idea that Denis Hurley has dreamt up (Eric) then watch this http://bit.ly/S8jmNf
On paper it’s light shirts and dark shorts against the reverse, but throw in number patches, side panels, several sponsors, collar designs and God knows what else and it becomes an unsightly mess and very unpleasant to watch – and not just because it’s rugby union!
Granted, it’s an extreme example, but football (whatever the code) looks better when a team wears as much as possible of their primary colour and as little as possible of anything else, and the opposition does the same.
I’m really looking forward to West Brom-Spurs.
Scotland v New Zealand from the 2007 World Cup was also a prime example http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LCsDkmwszU
Yeah, I remember that one. But I think the key difference is that the Scotland-Somewhat Blacks game, on paper, and if the shirts were accurately depicted, could have been a clash. That’s not necessarily the case with the London Irish-Harlequins one – especially if the submitted illustrations of the playing wear were devoid of added details, as is possible.
I’m not so sure that you would have had flagged Jay – http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_qDvLM4MHG6s/TNyjwQaiK5I/AAAAAAAABKs/FagoQNkpEmI/s1600/DSC03075.JPG and http://2.bp.blogspot.com/–ho6WsgF_So/Tz4oxOQhdrI/AAAAAAAACQU/e1rIOMRf8oY/s1600/IMG_2852%2B%25282%2529.JPG
i don’t know if anyone else watched the football league show this weekend. both sheff wed and hull wore their 3rd/last seasons away kits at their respective away games. sheff wed in all silver/grey , hull in light blue and white.
Hull City wore their third kit as they were using the ‘tash converters’ sponsor. They had a batch of unprinted third kits and it would be easier than reprinting their black kits.
Haven’t seen any footage of the Sunderland – Middlesbrough game from last night but somebody mentioned to me today that ‘Boro wore their light blue away kit (no surprise there, of course) but their keeper was also decked out in light blue. Surely not!!
Well they must have been having you on, Ronan.
Middlesbrough’s keeper wore orange, in fact both he and Sunderland’s keeper wore identical kits!
Yeah, both goalkeepers wearing the same colour (let alone kit!) is frowned upon these days. But I think most of the Adidas teams have only been given the orange and light blue goalkeeper kits, very few teams seem to have been given the ‘tan’ kit.
I think this is the case for both Sunderland and Middlesbrough. So it was either both wear the orange, which isn’t ideal, but doesn’t really cause a problem. Or, one of the teams wearing the light blue goalkeeper kit. Which obviously wouldn’t as Middlesbrough away kit is light blue.
I’m not sure why Adidas haven’t given everyone the tan goalkeeper kit, aswell. Only Bolton do, as far as I know. And Hull, after they asked for it.
Seen it myself now Jon. Trip to ‘Specsavers’ for my mate I reckon (or cut down on the pints!….)
Any chance there may have been a half-time change? Neither scenario is really acceptable so either could have been changed for a perceived lesser evil.
Hull City played Leicester in there home kit with the Goalie in all orange.
Goalkeepers are allowed the same kit on the assumption they can’t go up for corners.
Arsenal kit man has had a shocker here. Surely they’d normally change the whole strip rather than compromise the integrity of a kit. Red socks with the purple kit looks awful.
Goalkeepers should always have a completely different kit to the outfielders, you wouldn’t have two teams wearing the same colour.
Sorry, Matt, are you saying that a goalkeeper is allowed to clash with his opposite number on the proviso he won’t come up for a corner even if the side is losing late on? Surely a match-specific rule shouldn’t be implemented just because the referee hasn’t done his job properly beforehand?
Andrew, I disagree. Yes, there’s an issue with the navy on the socks not matching but that could be (has been) interpreted as black or purple. Otherwise the red and white links in reasonably well. It was the best option as the Away socks would have clashed and the Home first choice ones would have created an unideal white/dark vs dark/white below waist conflict (overall clash territory).
Personally I would have loved to see them wear their yellow socks but that’s just me…
I suspect Matt’s comment was made with tongue firmly in cheek.
The Goons should be in yellow, this kit doesn’t work. Arguably white socks would have been better than red.
Why would white be better than red in that situation? For aesthetics or functionality?
Ah, Matt’s sarcasm may have gone over my head there.
Agreed about the ManU/Arsenal game. I feel in situations like this that Home team could help out a little. We all know Fergie likes the white socks; surely this would be solving the clash. At the end of the day any clash affects both teams and does it really matter who solves it! I’m obviously not insinuating that the home team should ever change their home strip fully; I’m just saying ManU could have made things easier by wearing white socks, it’s not exactly like it’s against their kit history (i.e. Liverpool). Got to agree that either team in White socks looks better than what we saw today.
As for the goalkeeper situation I feel that predominantly one teams Goalkeeper shirt should be different colour to everyone else on the pitch. What happened to the days when teams played in Red & Blue with GK’s in Green & Yellow with the Referee in Black!! Sadly I don’t feel this will happen any time soon! But as for having a GK shirt the same colour as the outfield shirt is just daft. Royal Blue & Sky Blue I can understand, but not Amber & Orange!
I know it isn’t as much of an issue but the Arsenal ‘Keeper kit was the same as the referee and linesman, don’t they have other options, for the Goalie or Ref
The officials have 4 options in the Umbro Diamond Kit. Black, Yellow, Red and Jade (Green) with Black pinstripes.
De Gea could have surely worn the blue ‘keeper shirt (wouldn’t’v clashed with the purple and black would it?) and then the officials could have worn green.
Re. Changing Socks
In the Bundesliga yesterday, FC Bayern played Hamburger SV. Bayern haven’t worn away shorts with the home strip for a long time, preferring the integrity of their all red strip, and couldn’t wear the standard away strip as it would have also clashed (HSV are known as the ‘Rote Hosen’ – Red Shorts, and never change these at home). This meant wearing the dark grey third, where the socks would have clashed. What was the outcome? ignoring it and hoping for the best? wearing the home or away socks where the colour/trim would’ve clashed horribly? no. adidas issued a pair of dedicated second choice socks, white with dark grey trim. Is it just me, or are clubs/the FA missing something in England that seems to be simplicity in Germany?
All the teams in the Premier League need to do is to organise what kits each other are going to wear before the season starts. And if there is a clash, just get alternate shorts/socks that won’t.
There seems to be a lack of planning in the Premier League and Football League unless individual teams do it themselves
I think the officials should wear black wherever possible, except if a team wears a strip that is too similar in colour or contrast. Also on the subject of goalkeeper kit clashes with the officials, I don’t recall anyone batting an eyelid in the days when goalkeepers, particularly in internationals, often wore a black strip.
And as for the comment about the Hull goalie, agree with that, and it ain’t the first time it’s happened – a few seasons ago Hull’s goalie wore a yellow jersey, whilst his team mates wore the amber home strip with had black stripes on the front. You would have thought Adidas would supply additional colours for their teams’ goalie strips, instead of just orange, gold or light blue; they’ve got other shirt designs of different colours available.
In addition I was quite surprised at Arsenal wearing a pair of alternate home socks with the away strip yesterday, given that in the past they’ve had an alternate pair for each of their choice of strips for quite a while. Mind you there was a time when Man U would often change their black socks for a white pair for a home match in the league as well, has that quirk been stopped?
United wore white socks v newcastle in the league cup,quite glad they never changed yesterday,not keen on it to be honest,United should always wear black socks at home and that includes european matches.
I haven’t watched as many games as I would like to have this season, so it may have slipped past past me, but have Chelsea worn their (very nice) white away kit yet?
Think they MAY have worn it in Europe, or maybe in one of the domestic cups, but the black (alleged) third kit has been used more in the league…can’t remember seeing Chelsea wear the white in the Prem. Most of the ‘blue’ teams have large quantities of white on their strips so the white (sadly) probably won’t get much use.
yesterday(tues 7th) Swansea’s U-21’s played at Ipswich. they wore their red away kit but with red short’s instead of the white pair they have worn in the premier league. seem’s team’s can wear proper non-clash kit’s when they want to.
Spurs will wear the Black and Silver halved shirt at City on Sunday. Surely all Navy would offer a better contrast as Silver and Sky Blue are quite similar? Madness
Not sarcasm….
2 Keepers can have the same colour/similar on, as long as they don’t appear in the opposing area. It’s not supposed to happen but does when kitmen can’t agree and referees allow.
Matt nobody can prevent a keeper from going up to the other penalty area, it’s not ideal if they have similar colours, the officials just have to be extra vigilant. All keepers wore green for years and years and it was never a problem.
John I know the Tottenham third kit is superfluous, but it seems to be the only new kit this season, as yet, unillustrated.
Thanks Martyn.
Yeah, it’s a shame it probably won’t get used much. Looking at John’s illustrations, the only place it’s almost guaranteed to be used is against Everton.
They might use it against West Brom, I suppose. What with West Brom’s home kit being predominately navy blue this season. Although I have a feeling that Chelsea will turn up at the Hawthornes with the black third kit.
Just flicked over to Middlesborough v Sheffield Wednesday live on Sky Sports, and Wednesday are wearing their yellow away kit for no reason.
Adam,
Think you’re probably right – WBA’s white shorts and socks will probably be considered sufficient to tell apart, even though navy and black could be considered a clash…I think that Chelsea should have called the white the third kit, seeing as it will get so little use. In the Bundesliga, my team FC Bayern have a white away kit and dark grey third, because the teams in Germany that play in red normally do so coupled with black, meaning that a white away sees plenty of action. It always boggles the mind that in England, where there are a LOT of blue and white striped teams right through the league, that kit suppliers don’t react in the same way. Surely it makes more sense from a marketing point of view? ie. more on the pitch use equals more cash through the till? Bayern’s white and flourescent red/orange shirt has had loads of use this season, and the dark grey third (officially called the ‘international’ strip) has been used for most of our games in Europe, meaning a good spread of sales for FCB and adidas. If I put my cynical head on, is that one of the reasons that Bayern have posted a profit for twelve years in a row and so many English clubs are in financial jeopardy? Every aspect counts, and strip choice/selection/marketing is surely as important as spending within your means and filling the stadium every week?
@543 – Our kitman told me thats what the Referee told him for a game last season.. For some reason the referee wouldn’t let us wear 2 of our 3 gk shirts and we have to wear one the same colour as the other keeper. The only condition was that as we couldn’t provide a suitably different colour shirt, he couldn’t go up for any last minute corners..
Bit far fetched if he was going to to lie…
Fulham are another team that seem to use their 3rd kit more often than their away kit. I thought that first kit should be used where possible, then away kit and 3rd kit was only used where home and away both clashed.
If the home kit clashes, then I don’t mind teams mixing it up and wearing the away kit sometimes, and the third kit sometimes.
It’s when teams just wear a change kit when they could wear the home kit, which annoys me.
Matt, your Ref sounds like a bit of a meverick. I always seem to do sides who’ve had such a ref the week before. “Last weeks Ref was OK with it…” or maybe they are trying to ‘play me’?
Matt, what team are we talking about here? I take it if you have a kitman it’s a decent level? It’s a ridiculous ruling from the ref, as surely one of the other two ‘keeper kits wouldn’t have caused a serious clash with outfield players or the opposition ‘keeper and if it was due to a clash with him (the ref) then it’d’ve been a better option.
I posed a trivia question on Twitter earlier and it didn’t get a sniff so I’ll try again here. The Spurs Third shirts today differed between themselves in that the long sleeved version had misaligned badges. Anyone know why that is? I’m 99.9% sure I know the answer…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0Tp0bHt5CE
Interesting and (as far as I can see) unnecessary socks change for Chelsea’s U18 team. I wonder if we’ll see this on the senior squad against Man. City later this season?
I can’t help thinking that Barcelona would have been better off wearing their home kit at Mallorca last night, rather than the orange and yellow away kit.
Barça had apparently retained last season’s black away strip as their third choice for this season, so why they haven’t worn that I don’t know.
Al, it may have been to avoid a clash with the referee, who was also wearing black shorts.
Adam, good call. Though I do love that Away kit.
They need to sell the Away, Jon, simple as that.
I see your point, Jon, but the third kit wasn’t really needed in the Mallorca game. The home would have sufficed.
They used the home kit away to Benfica in the Champions League, and they even have a red goalkeeper kit, which has been used with the home kit a few times this season. So it seems that red isn’t considered to clash with the home kit. Which I agree with.
Jay, a stab in the dark says that the long-sleeved shirts had misaligned badges as they were the ones that were always going to have a poppy printed on them but some Spurs players chose short sleeves instead. Have I won anything??
I believe, and I may be wrong, that a lot of manufacturers actually apply distinguishing details to (or remove them from) the upper central section of the front of long-sleeved football shirts so they can be easily identified when they are folded and packaged in a cellophane square for dispatch to clubs and retailers. Yes, they will generally have a serial number sticker and other identifying labels but stickers can fall off and mistakes can be made.
I’m not sure I’ve seen misaligned badges before but I have seen watermarks being removed and collars differing.
Check these two pictures of Paolo Maldini in the “same” shirt. The long-sleeved version has a round rather than v neck and moves the three gold stars to the sleeve too.
http://bit.ly/TBU4Gy
http://bit.ly/TBUbSi
@ Jay29ers. Good point about the ref which makes me think the combination will be seen again with the first team. I think it may have been an inadvertent joke on your part too. After all Chelsea are good at “clashing” with referees lately!
Was anybody else surprised that in the Sweden v England match, both team wore their home kits?
Usually somebody wears an away kit in games between the two…
Maybe the 2 countries just decided amongst themselves rather than having some FIFA bigwig choose.
You might be right, there Andrew.
Maybe things are relaxed for friendly matches? I just remembered a friendly between the two at Old Trafford in 2001, where both teams wore their home kit.
Also, it’s the same thing between England and Brazil. One team usually changes, an example being the match at the 2002 World Cup, when Brazil wore blue.
Yet when the two teams played each in other in friendlies in 2007, at Wembley, and in 2009, in Doha, both teams wore their home kits.
Adam,
You’re right, England normally play in their away kit when they play Sweden (most recently I think in the 2006 World Cup – featuring Joe Cole’s 30 yarder), but England tend to be more fluid when it comes to friendlies…maybe because their away strip at the mo is that dodgy navy and sky blue concoction and that was deemed to clash with Sweden’s home as well.