I was going to go with, “Nike announces new football kits for World Cup” as the title but I didn’t want to completely alienate whomever might accidentally find themselves on this page…
Last week Nike announced new national team jerseys for 10 teams in advance of this summer’s World Cup, including the US and favorites Brazil, Netherlands, and England. Thanks to lots of research and development, Nike has created jerseys that are on the cutting edge of jersey-making technology (read: these new jerseys will cost fans a fortune). According to Nike the new jerseys keep a player’s body 7% cooler than previous jerseys, are 13% lighter and 10% stretchier. I think it would be entertaining to see some video of how they tested these jerseys to get these numbers, I’m picturing people running on a treadmill with thermometers attached to their chests, and guys in lab coats writing things down on clipboards.
And since you can’t sell anything new these days without it being eco-conscious, the jerseys are partly made from plastic bottles. Eight plastic bottles go into each and every jersey.
On the inside of each jersey, underneath the team crest near the heart, is what Nike is calling the “Inner Pride graphic.” From what I can tell it is an inspirational slogan or graphic specific to each country. For the US jerseys we get the familiar but still pretty badass, “Don’t Tread on Me.” U-S-A! U-S-A!
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I saw the new US national team jerseys in action this week for the first time in their friendly against the Netherlands, who also happened to be wearing their new jerseys as well. I was not a fan of the previous US national team jersey, so I definitely like the new one more. To me the previous white jersey with horizontal red pinstripes just didn’t look like a proper jersey for a legitimate national team. This new jersey on the other hand says, “we are totally a real soccer team, you guys” so hopefully that means we score more than one goal in this World Cup.
The part of the new jersey design that jumps out is the diagonal white stripe running down the front of the jersey (it’s totally not a sash though, ok?). It turns out the diagonal stripe is a reference to the US national team jersey of the 1950 World Cup team, and it also means we are out for blood. During the 1950 World Cup, the US team upset England 1-0 in group play, a game that has since become known, by some people at least, as the “miracle on grass.” People in England are still upset about it apparently, and the vast majority of people in the US don’t even know the game ever took place. So why is this significant and why do our jerseys for this World Cup have a similar stripe? Because the US is playing England on June 12th in their first game of group play. And by wearing the stripe on the jersey the team is effectively telling England that we are going to bring it like we brought it 60 years ago. So yeah, we’re kind of putting all our eggs in one basket by committing to wearing a jersey for the entire tournament just to psych out one team. And if the US gets thrashed the jersey choice might further the embarrassment—not even the magical jerseys could help get the win. But it could also be the biggest game the US plays in the tournament, and certainly because it’s the first game it would be great to start things off positively.
