Culture

In Depth: The Nostalgia of Retro Football Kits

Retro football kits are adored by fans across the world. With their unique designs and extravagant colours, these shirts are often something special.

Retro football kits are adored by fans across the world. With their unique designs and extravagant colours, these shirts are often something special.

With a growing hype surrounding football jerseys from across the world, we’re going to take a look at some of the nostalgic shirts of yesteryear and why they were so adored.

Barcelona home shirt 2010/11

This perfectly-designed kit is synonymous with the beautiful game.

When you think of a Barcelona shirt, this is the one that comes to mind. Under Pep Guardiola, Barca won the 2010/11 league title by four points and played with the type of verve, domination and flamboyance that have long been associated with their former Spanish coach.

With Victor Valdes in between the sticks, Carlos Puyol partnering a 24-year old Gerard Pique at centre-back and the Xavi-Iniesta partnership orchestrated the midfield, this Barcelona team was something special – and we haven’t even mentioned a 23-year old Lionel Messi!

Brazil shirt 1970

If you want slick passing football on an international scale, Brazil’s all-conquering team of 1970 is the place to look.

The Seleção picked up their third World Cup title with a 4-1 victory over Italy at the Estadio Azteca in a game most know for Carlos Alberto’s sensational goal, epitomising everything good about Brazil’s liquid football at the time.

Alberto’s strike is widely seen as the greatest ever goal, and with Pele and Jairzinho also getting on the scoresheet in the final, this simplistic jersey is memorable for all the right reasons.

England shirt 1966

When thinking of iconic shirts of the past, how could we not include England’s famous red shirt of 1966 – the year that football really did come home.

Geoff Hurst’s two injury-time goals sent the country into a state of euphoria. Under the stewardship of Alf Ramsey, this is England’s greatest ever footballing moment.

The elegance of this red-and-white kit is quite apt considering the magnitude of such a colossal event in English football.

West Germany shirt 1990

If World Cup glory is the theme of the day, we can’t ignore West Germany’s sophisticated, yet quirky design in 1990.

With the likes of Jürgen Klinsmann and Lothar Matthäus, Die Mannschaft’s star-studded line-up clinched a 1-0 victory over Argentina, courtesy of Andreas Brehme’s late penalty.

Out of all of Germany’s kits over the years, this one is the most memorable for a variety of reasons, and is one that I’m sure they may look at replicating in the years ahead.

Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Most Popular

To Top