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Circling back to this, the official FIFA graphic unfortunately shows Argentina in white shorts and socks: If true, this will actually cause there to be less overall contrast than if they went with the black shorts and socks. I can’t imagine this was Argentina’s choice, as they’ve worn the black shorts all three times they’ve worn their home kits in this WC so far. I would assume FIFA demanded it because of the refs wearing all-black, which really doesn’t seem necessary at all. Worth mentioning that these graphics have had a couple of errors, but I’m not optimistic that that’s the case here.

Friday’s quarterfinal between Argentina and Netherlands will indeed feature both teams in their first choice kits:

It will never not be hilarious to me that Kansas State does the Cowboys 1000x better than the actual Cowboys.

Argentina/Australia really was an awesome looking game. The splotchy Australia shirt isn’t my favorite, but I love the gold/green/white kit combo and it contrasted beautifully with La Albiceleste. Looking ahead to Argentina/Netherlands, both teams should be able to wear their first choice kits. Only question in my mind is whether Argentina wear black or white socks. Also, here’s confirmation of the Brazil/South Korea and Portugal/Switzerland kits:

The last two Round of 16 matchups are set and they should be pretty straightforward in terms of kits. Brazil/South Korea should be yellow/blue/white vs. all-red, while Portugal/Switzerland should be red/green/red vs. white/gray/white. Have to say, while I’m almost never a proponent of a team wearing their away kit when it isn’t necessary, I wouldn’t be mad if South Korea opted for their black away kit vs. Brazil just because of how good it is. I’m sure they’ll wear red as long as there isn’t a keeper or ref kit clash, but still this kit matchup would be pretty awesome:

I believe they are a very light gray to match the subtle gradient on the front of the shirt:

Kit matchups for 6/8 Round of 16 matches: Really happy to see that both Argentina/Australia and France/Poland feature each country’s traditional/first choice kit combos. England in all-white against Senegal is unnecessary. Glad to see that Japan does indeed have dedicated blue shorts for their home kit.

Here’s the Morocco/Spain kit matchup. White clash shorts for Spain’s away kit, which I wouldn’t say is necessary but does enhance the overall dark vs. light contrast.

Morocco/Spain and Japan/Croatia should be two more good looking games in the Round of 16. The former should look similar to the Portugal/Spain Nations League match from back in September: Think it’s most likely that Japan/Croatia will be Japan in all-blue vs. Croatia in their checkered shirts and white shorts/socks. I’m hoping Japan does have dedicated blue alternative shorts for their home kit instead of just having to use the black away shorts:

Belgium’s flame kit has really not grown on me at all. In fact I’d say it’s just looked worse and worse in my mind. That said, I suppose the flames are fitting seeing as their Golden Generation just flamed out big time. On the other hand, Croatia’s kit has actually grown on me quite a bit. I think it’s a pretty unique take on the checkered look and I think the increased amount of white is what has allowed them to wear the kit against red teams like Morocco and Belgium.

Not the worst possible option (all-white), but would’ve much preferred white/blue/white or all-blue. This very well may have been a case where the keeper kits dictated the US’ kit choice. The Dutch keepers wore green in all three group stage matches, but the US had to use it here because of their other registered keeper kits (orange and yellow) not being viable options. The purple keeper kit for the Dutch then probably ruled out the blue secondary kit for the US. Dumb that the US chose the white/white/blue combo over white/blue/white, but that is the combo that was shown in the promo images when the kit was unveiled.

Really hope we get this kit matchup in Argentina/Australia:

It’s a pretty common practice. The US has two different pairs of blue shorts. Germany have two pairs of white AND black shorts. France have two different pairs of blue shorts and I’m pretty sure two different pairs of white shorts. There are probably more examples, but it’s not at all an uncommon thing.

Yeah, strange decision to have the shorts match the dark green of the collar and underarm inserts instead of the lighter green base color of the shirt. It’s not a bad look per se, but would’ve looked better with lighter green shorts. At first glance I thought they might just be the away shorts, but those have off-white Adidas stripes:

I’m personally hoping for orange vs. blue, as I much prefer the blue kit over the white. I’d be fine with the white kit IF they wear it with the superior blue shorts. I’ll be curious what the US keepers wear. So far they’ve worn orange or yellow, both of which obviously won’t work against the Netherlands. The keeper kit available at retail is dark red, but they might not have registered it for this tournament (teams usually have to register three keeper kits, if I remember right).

Looks like Argentina will actually be in white socks today against Mexico instead of black. The kit assignment graphic showed black socks. You can see the strange mashup kit that Mexico’s keepers will be using today here: Will definitely be an odd look with the shirt having black and neon green accents and the shorts just being blue and white.

The USMNT looks to be wearing the solid royal blue socks instead of the tie-dye version that they’ve previously worn with the away kit. These are the same plain socks that the WNT have worn with this kit. Can’t imagine it’s a FIFA thing, as Belgium’s flame socks, Croatia’s one solid/one checkered socks, etc. have been allowed up to this point. The kit assignment graphic even showed the tie-dye socks:

Looks nothing like any number font the Ducks have had.

The Beavs have announced black/orange/orange, so we’re officially getting color vs. color again and the same exact matchup as last year:

I really like the green vs. orange and vastly prefer it over the yellow vs. black (2006 & 2018) and yellow vs. orange (2020) matchups. The two schools’ primary colors are definitely very bright but I think the green vs. orange is a really nice showcase of those colors. I do get the color blind issue, though, especially with the Color Rush style mono vs. mono matchup. Ideally I’d like something like green jerseys & yellow pants for the Ducks against orange jerseys & black pants for the Beavs.

Rodolfo Landeros just said that Luis Enrique requested for Spain to wear all-red in this tournament. They’re scheduled to wear all-red in all three group stage matches instead of the more traditional red/blue/blue.

France/Australia is pretty close to perfection in terms of the kit matchup. Will be hard to top.

Argentina and Mexico both looked incredible today in their primary kits. Can’t wait for the matchup between these two on Saturday; it’ll be a tense matchup after both teams suffered disappointing results today (especially the shocker from La Albiceleste) but also because it’ll be an incredible kit matchup.

Following up on this, the numbers are placed that low to accommodate the match printing: Makes sense, there’s not really much room above the crest to put the match printing and putting it on either side of the crest would look odd and unbalanced. Now that doesn’t excuse the off-centered printing as seen on McKennie’s jersey for the media shoot, so hopefully that does get fixed.

This is the best possible matchup between the Chargers and Chiefs IMO. Also one of the best possible matchups across the whole league.