Soccer jerseys & colors

[hjwii]

Two soccer jersey related questions:

1. It would appear that the home soccer jersey and the away soccer jerseys are never from the same color swatch. For example, Barcelona has navy/burgundy striped home jerseys, while away they wear turquoise stripes; or Newcastle United has the black/white ref stripes at home, but pale blue away. Can someone tell me why this is? Is it simply a marketing ploy to get the rabid hooligans to buy more jerseys? Or is there something in the history of soccer that calls for this?

2. We've all seen them on ebay... the $20 "authentic" soccer jerseys (and football jerseys for that matter too...nono..AMERICAN football). THey look real, feel real, taste real... but obviously they are not real authentic genuine jerseys. So, what makes them not real? Is it the heat transfers sponsors and numbers? Cheaper material? Different cut (why oh why isn't there a universal size for Mediums or X-Larges???)

I'll admit, I've bought a few on ebay... they wear fine, look fine (except you never know about the XL...sometimes just right, sometimes a lil snug...) and for $20-40 versus the $75-125 for the real thing, it doesn't seem so bad.

Anyways, I look forward to the responses...

hjwii

[hecticbro]

I think the jersey color is a cultural thing. They don't necessarily have "home" and "away" uniforms, just a main uniform in their actual colors and an alternate uniform in completely different colors in case they have to play a team that wears the same colors as they do.

[TFoA]

Two soccer jersey related questions:

1. It would appear that the home soccer jersey and the away soccer jerseys are never from the same color swatch. For example, Barcelona has navy/burgundy striped home jerseys, while away they wear turquoise stripes; or Newcastle United has the black/white ref stripes at home, but pale blue away. Can someone tell me why this is? Is it simply a marketing ploy to get the rabid hooligans to buy more jerseys? Or is there something in the history of soccer that calls for this?

It's simple: There are no set home/away jerseys in international soccer. Instead, there's primary kits and change kits. Unless the teams colors clash (like, if Man U were to play AC Milan), they both wear their primary (or, "home") kits. The change kit is used so that basically you can tell who the other team is, and, it's an opportunity for the other team to get a bit crazy. You can see that with Chelsea having a highlighter yellow change kit for this year.

[MJWalker45]

Some change kits have a tradition of use and thus now get rotated every year like ManU(blue, white, black) or they stick to one color like AC Milan (white with red accent) because of town colors. Or like Chelsea's highliters and Barcas electric orange just to stand out from other teams

[powersurge]

Its funny, because we chastise American sports teams for having 'alternate' uniforms, while they've been present in soccer for years.

The difference is that the 'soccer alternate' actually has some importance and relevance other than just to sell more jerseys. (Though I'm sure soccer teams do go a step further in favor of additional jersey sales)

[Gothamite]

It's also worth nothing that while teams change their uniforms on a regular basis (in England it's two years, and when a new uniform is unveiled they announce when it's going to be retired), teams don't change their colors. It does happen, but very, very rarely.

So a team like West Ham, which wears claret and blue, can add a black change kit to boost merchandise sales without selling out their history for a few pounds.

[illwauk]

Somewhat O/T... I wish North American teams would adopt the euro mentality when it comes to primary/change vs. home/away. I know I'd prefer to see the Packers in green at least 14 games a year (the other 2 being a fluke of scheduling that would have them on the road against Phily and NY in the same year).

[Joely]

Irritatingly, some english clubs have started wearing their away kit regardless of whether the home clashes...a recent example was when West Ham palyed Man City in their white kit, whislt city were in a very light sky blue, which was fine in person, but on a rainy/cloudy day (and in manchester their are many) makes it diffuclt to distinguish on television.

Also, teams are tending t ohave a third kit fairly regularly (especially those in european competition), with united and liverpool both having shirts of the same colour, but with different detailing worn during the same season, albeit in different competitions..very irritating. I wish we kept our kits longer and didn't allow shirt sponsorship as is the case in america. Identity can be strong through a colour, but a consistant uniform is good too - jordan won 6 nba championships in the same uniform - that couldn't happen in football, which i think is sad...

[rmered]

The difference between soccer and American sports is that soccer has been going longer.

Soccer teams had one uniform because that's all players could afford, and I say that because in older days, the player had to provide the uniform.

So the traditional uniform is the club's colours, and obviously, with most cities having a soccer team, it didn't take long for clubs to end up playing another club with the same or very similar uniform.

Hence the need for an alternate/away.

These days uniforms are now regarded as revenue streams, so the way they are used leans more towards the legitimising and promotion of the various shirts and less to the reasons for wearing them.

As for why they can sell something so cheap, yet so close in price, the market for soccer shirts is huge, the cost of making them is low, and the knock-offs are not paying a licence feee to make them.

As for the American market, the American retailers know they can sell as many half knockoffs at $50 as they can at $20, so why not take the extra cash? EG 5,000 shirts at $50 is $250k, where as 10,000 shirts at $20 is only $200k.

[jr79]

2. We've all seen them on ebay... the $20 "authentic" soccer jerseys (and football jerseys for that matter too...nono..AMERICAN football). THey look real, feel real, taste real... but obviously they are not real authentic genuine jerseys. So, what makes them not real? Is it the heat transfers sponsors and numbers? Cheaper material? Different cut (why oh why isn't there a universal size for Mediums or X-Larges???)

I'll admit, I've bought a few on ebay... they wear fine, look fine (except you never know about the XL...sometimes just right, sometimes a lil snug...) and for $20-40 versus the $75-125 for the real thing, it doesn't seem so bad.

Anyways, I look forward to the responses...

hjwii

Those eBay specials are usually pirated merchandise so you have no idea what you're getting until its in your hands. The cut, materials, resemblance to actual team jerseys etc is completely random.

[Gothamite]

The difference between soccer and American sports is that soccer has been going longer.

Soccer teams had one uniform because that's all players could afford, and I say that because in older days, the player had to provide the uniform.

So the traditional uniform is the club's colours, and obviously, with most cities having a soccer team, it didn't take long for clubs to end up playing another club with the same or very similar uniform.

Hence the need for an alternate/away.

Um, that's exactly what the NFL used to do (minus the players owning them, which I'm not sure is true).

Teams played in their team colors. Even when both teams wore the same colors. When the Bears played the Packers, it was navy against navy.

Finally, after a couple decades, some teams started wearing alternate colors against those foes, and eventually the league mandated alts across the board.

I'm not sure that it has anything to do with which sport is older - Arsenal, one of the most storied clubs in English football, didn't create their first change strip until 1950. This was after NFL teams had started to do this. The only difference is that the NFL required that the alts be white, and in soccer the teams chould choose their own colors.

[HeyDingis]

A couple of notes to add to this discussion:

Regarding the $20 jerseys, they are cheap because they are fake. If you look on the ebay listings, more often than not, they go out of their way to avoid the word "authentic" so that they are not lying. They'll say things like "Hi-quality replica," "embroidered club badge," "new with tags," and sometimes even "embroidered Nike logo." Technically, none of these things are incorrect. They are, in the seller's opinion at least, "hi quality replicas." They do have embroidered logos, and they may even come with tags attached. But since they haven't used the word "authentic," they are not guilty of fraud. More often than not, you'll find these shirts from sellers in Thailand. Now, if you find a slightly older shirt on ebay for $20, the seller is from the UK, and they are advertising it as authentic, it's very likely that it really is authentic.

Secondly, regarding the colors for away shirts...While teams may have several different colors of away shirts throughout the years, they do often keep a small rotation of the colors they will choose from for their away shirts. For instance, Arsenal pretty much always has either a blue/navy away shirt or a yellow one. In America, a team like Arsenal would probably naturally have a white away shirt - but Arsenal's rivals, Tottenham, wear white, meaning that for most of Arsenal's history (until this year) they've staunchly avoided wearing a white shirt. The same goes for Barcelona, who will never wear white because Real Madrid's main color is white. I suppose the point I'm getting at is that, while there are a variety of colors that clubs will wear for their away shirt, they are generally more specific about the colors they will NOT wear. Man City won't wear Red, Liverpool won't wear Royal, and Newcastle won't wear red (or at least red stripes).

The stripes bring up another issue. Soccer is one of the few sports in which broad stripes are not only accepted, they are prevalent. This means that, for a team like Sunderland, their shirts are both red and white. Therefore, a team playing at sunderland cannot wear red nor white shirts. This may also explain why some away shirts are so flamboyant and different from the home shirts. While in America it would make sense for a team like Liverpool (who wear red) to just have a white away shirt, both of those shirts would clash when they played Sunderland. They can avoid this problem entirely by wearing a yellow shirt.

If you're looking for one solid answer as to why English teams especially wear so many different colors, you're probably not going to get one. There's no REAL reason that Liverpool should wear a yellow shirt one year and a black shirt the next year. It's just because they can. But there is, contrary to how it may appear, a method to the madness.

[Moser316]

The difference between soccer and American sports is that soccer has been going longer.

Soccer teams had one uniform because that's all players could afford, and I say that because in older days, the player had to provide the uniform.

So the traditional uniform is the club's colours, and obviously, with most cities having a soccer team, it didn't take long for clubs to end up playing another club with the same or very similar uniform.

Hence the need for an alternate/away.

Um, that's exactly what the NFL used to do (minus the players owning them, which I'm not sure is true).

Teams played in their team colors. Even when both teams wore the same colors. When the Bears played the Packers, it was navy against navy.

Finally, after a couple decades, some teams started wearing alternate colors against those foes, and eventually the league mandated alts across the board.

I'm not sure that it has anything to do with which sport is older - Arsenal, one of the most storied clubs in English football, didn't create their first change strip until 1950. This was after NFL teams had started to do this. The only difference is that the NFL required that the alts be white, and in soccer the teams chould choose their own colors.

Of course, this was probably out of necessity as several clubs have considered white their home color (i.e. Tottenham Hotspur, Preston North End, Fulham, etc.)

[Gothamite]

Don't know about that - there had been NFL teams before that which used white as their home color (including, briefly, the Packers).

The FA could have done what the NFL eventually did - mandated that all teams use a white change kit, except for the teams who wore white as a first choice, who would have to adopt a colored jersey. But they didn't.

Different choices at the time means a very different visual legacy today.