2010-2011 Football Thread

[Lord Blackadder]

Members of the 2010-2011 Football Thread Hooooooooo!!!

I'm still in podcast-withdrawl since the WC ended.

I think Eduardo is going for a fresh start without fading completely from the european stage so I think the move is a good one. Plus, Wegner allowing him to leave just might underline his expectations of Chamakh, someone I've long admired and excited to see in the EPL.

Wenger is famous for selling players just as their talents begin to wane but before they lose value. Could this be the case with Eduardo? He's still young, but perhaps Wenger feels he has not and will not fully recover his pre-injury form. Which would be a shame.

That Mancini chap's just been on Sky Sports News saying he'd like to sign Landon Donovan for Manchester City. Obviously Landycakes has a fair few fans amongst our American regulars here, so we'll have to see if City make or move or the manager's talk is just bluster.

I oppose the idea on the notion that, at overcrowded City, Donovan would see very, very little playing time. I only want to see him move to Europe if he gets starts, or at least a lot of playing time, and you can bet that Donovan himself is likely to demand as much in any contract negotiations. He proved he was starting XI material at Everton, and one would have to imagine he's most likely to go back there IF he returns to Europe.

City is so stacked with talent that a lot of good players are going to be riding the bench. I hope Donovan isn't one of them.

 

[philbeeney]

Brighton & Hove Albion (League 1) managed to draw 1-1 with Sunderland (Premiership) in a pre-season friendly in Portugal today.

It's looking good for Gus Poyet and his blue & white army. Go Seagulls.!!!!!!!!

 

[Jaffa Cake]

The mighty Tigers fly out this morning ahead of playing Sunderland on Saturday, so hopefully you've softened them up a bit.

I don't know if the Raich Carter Trophy will be on the line, though.

 

[pachyderm]

No, the shirts have to be distinct too – at least in this country – hence my surprise at the two shirts being identical save for the sleeves. Perhaps the approach is different down under?

In terms of change kits, it's always been the shirt that's been the focus – at least, since caps and sashes were abandoned. Back in the very early days of the game players would buy their own kit and – while their shirts were usually very similar to those of their team mates – it wasn't uncommon for players to tip up in differently coloured leg wear. In fact, up until the 1920s it was the custom that the home team would change their shirts in the event of a clash rather than the away side – the FA changed the rule, but noted that only shirts needed to be changed, both teams could wear their first choice shorts and socks if they so wished.

Nowadays though, as you say, it's quite common for teams to have an alternative set of shorts and socks to wear with their home shirt should their lower-half garments clash with the opposition. A notable example would be Manchester United – their first choice kit features white shorts but it's not uncommon to see them turn out in black ones should their opponents be wearing light-hued shorts themselves.

When I saw the new Sydney Rovers shirts, it reminded me of an issue with the Crystal Palace away shirt of a couple of seasons back...

View attachment 240117

The away kit pictured was rarely used after officials complained that the red and blue swooshes made the shirts too similar to those of other red-clad clubs when seen from the side. Palace had to instead wear an all white third shirt, which was actually their training top customised with the sponsor's logo.

Given that problems can be caused by such a relatively small area of colour, it does seem very odd (to me at least) that the two Rovers' shirts aren't more distinct from one another. Looking at comments online I can see that quite a few other folk have raised the same point – if I was a more cynical chap, I might think that they'll perhaps settle on a different away design after a 'period of consultation' and say that they've made the change after listening to fan opinion, showing that the new club listens to their supporters. But I'm not that cynical, so I won't suggest it.

good stuff Jaffa.

My son who is player and a ref hates the recent kit change our league made: all teams have two shirts, 1 red, 1 white, black shorts and RED SOCKS.
The socks are the problem. Every match there is a point where all he is looking at is red legs fighting for a ball and he used to be able to say "yellow throw, green etc etc". Now he is a smart boy and a good ref but even he has complained that it makes the teams too similar and it has caused some doubt in his decisions.

 

[Jaffa Cake]

On the subject of kit...

When West Ham announced that Macron would be sorting them out with their polyester apparel some folk got a bit worried – they're not a big enough name for a Premier League club, apparently. Indeed, the Cockney DJ on the radio this morning was bemoaning the fact that his club deserved a more prestigious kit provider.

Anyway, the new West Ham home kit was unveiled earlier, and I think it's lovely...



My one gripe would be that Macron's large logo on the arms looks unsightly, but that and a less than elegant sponsor aside I think they've excelled themselves. That's a proper collar.

 

[pachyderm]

this is where i usually bump heads with our english footy brethren... collars, most of them seem to love them. i do not. i have seen two this season that i like(Celtic-classic and Rangers) but neither are in the Prem, the english Prem that is.

and claret and blue. can't stand it and i'm surprised to see so many teams with that color combo.

adding to my faves:

Forest home. lovely.

 

[Jaffa Cake]

I saw the Forest shirt yesterday and it is indeed lovely, although it's the same basic shirt as West Brom's (also splendid) away offering. Simple and elegant, so it is. I strongly suspect though that it will be sponsored up, which will be a shame.

Interesting what you say about collars, there does seem to be more of a preference for them here. I suppose one reason might be that with football having a longer history in these parts we've all seen pictures of the players of yesteryear wearing the old fashioned collared shirts – perhaps it's a subconscious hankering for the perceived 'good old days' when football was a a simpler game and a bit more in touch with the fan on the street, I don't know.

I did note too a little while ago that when we were discussing the new Hull City home shirt that most of the folk who said they didn't like it were from the UK, while those who favoured it were from overseas. I think this highlights some differences in what we consider to be 'good' shirt designs in various parts of the world. I think I'm right in saying that the basic templates that we're using were debuted in the US with the various MLS teams, so perhaps there's something about their design that appeals to American fans more so than us UKers, who perhaps have more ingrained, traditional notions of what a football shirt should look like.

and claret and blue. can't stand it and i'm surprised to see so many teams with that color combo.

I believe that Aston Villa were first notable club with the combination and that a number of others copied them, hoping that some of their success would rub off on them. I think too that they donated old shirts to a couple of fledgling clubs who retained the colours – West Ham may be one such club but I may be mistaken.

On a similar note – and linking in with the shirt you posted above – Woolwich Arsenal first adopted red shirts due to Nottingham Forest donating them a set of their old clobber, and the Gunners have worn red ever since.

 

[pachyderm]

Jaffa you take the Cake!

i think you summed it up nicely.

collars = simpler times, halcyon times, if you will, and familiarity for UK fans.

Most folks at the Wednesday board i post at seem to like the collars.

 

[OllyW]

collars = simpler times, halcyon times, if you will, and familiarity for UK fans.

Oh yeah!

Those were the days.

 

[Jaffa Cake]

Most folks at the Wednesday board i post at seem to like the collars.

If Smyrna Wednesday are entering this season's [gratuitous plug]MacRumors Fantasy League[/gratuitous plug] I'll make sure they're equipped in collar-free polyester rags.

Those were the days.

Heh. We sported an almost identical shirt at the same time, swap the badges and you wouldn't be able to tell them apart. Manchester United had a version too, when I think of George Best I always picture him in it.

 

[awmazz]

That's a proper collar.

+1.

Proper collar - the one Cantona used to wear up. He couldn't look cool as he did scoring that FA Cup goal in a t-shirt.

I know a lot of rugby kits have gone collarless as well in recent times, but that's a bad move marketing wise if you ask me in terms of selling replica kits that people can actually wear places. The Forest shirt for instance is just a red t-shirt. The classic rugby shirt with collar actually became a standard fashion item you could wear everywhere. Compare Italy 1994 with Italy 2010, which would you wear to the pub? The one on the right is just for die-hard fanatical supporters, not for casual wear.

 

[Jaffa Cake]

For me, a collar is just part of the overall design - done properly and on the right shirt they look good, but used poorly they can spoil a shirt that would perhaps be better without.

However, it should be noted that the greatest shirt in the history of football employed a collar...



Lovely stuff, and a shirt I'm sure awmazz would be proud to wear in any pub.

 

[awmazz]

Ugh, I'd rather wear an Italy shirt.

I have no idea what team that is, but let me guess they're called the Tigers. Lucky they aren't called the Leopards or they'd be looking like The Nanny's mother.

 

[Jaffa Cake]

It's a Hull City shirt from the early 1990s, and I assure you that my replica version looks splendid on me.

 

[awmazz]

That was a serious Hull City kit?? And you bought one of the two replica shirts they actually sold?

I fully concur that your new one looks great. Standards have been set.

 

[oscillatewildly]

...

Heh. We sported an almost identical shirt at the same time, swap the badges and you wouldn't be able to tell them apart. Manchester United had a version too, when I think of George Best I always picture him in it.

 

[pachyderm]

That was a serious Hull City kit?? And you bought one of the two replica shirts they actually sold?

I fully concur that your new one looks great. Standards have been set.

The new Hull City is a thing of beauty. Not as good as two seasons ago but it is close.

If Smyrna Wednesday are entering this season's [gratuitous plug]MacRumors Fantasy League[/gratuitous plug] I'll make sure they're equipped in collar-free polyester rags.

...

we'll be there.

 

[Jaffa Cake]

we'll be there.

Good – I expect the same of the rest of you lot, too.

Aye, that's the one. Bloody manufacturers and their templates, eh?

That was a serious Hull City kit?? And you bought one of the two replica shirts they actually sold?

Yes, it was a totally serious shirt – at the time, a lot of teams had bizarre and in many cases garish kits. Two key reasons were that the technology had reached a point where it was becoming cheaper for the manufacturers to produce unusual, complex designs, and also that counterfeit kits were starting to become a problem – the more complex the pattern the harder it was to copy.

The shirt's often tagged 'the worst football shirt ever' whenever there's an article about, er, worst football shirts ever, but I think that's a little harsh. There were some truly terrible shirts out there, and at least ours had a degree of relevance to the club. I think that fact that we were an unfashionable little club knocking about the lower ends of the league made us more a target of derision.

Today, the shirts are a bit of a collector's item and it's not uncommon to see them worn at matches. I was clad in mine for much of our promotion season – culminating in a victorious visit to Wembley – as well as other matches such as our win against Arsenal at the Emirates, so it's brought us a bit of luck along the way.

For a bit of an insight into how they were received at the time, here's a clip from the archives. You may think that the shirts look ridiculous, but as we can hear it's the long shorts that make players look ridiculous.

 

[MackPro91]

Forest home. lovely.

Excellent kit!

 

[awmazz]

GToday, the shirts are a bit of a collector's item

I can imagine there's only a limited number in existence so they'd be a rarity.

Well, I guess if you keep wearing it for luck Hull can get back up again, or going by your previous comment you may prefer them to stay down? I suspect Blackpool will go straight back down. Actually, I hope they get flogged every game. Nothing against Blackpool, just the system. Not a very good one if you ask me that lets the 6th placed team get promoted ahead of the 3rd, 4th and even 5th (even though that's how Arsenal got promoted).

Same thing happened with the Rugby League here last season where the Grand Final to decide the champions, ie the best team of the season, was between the 4th and 8th placed teams, leaving me thinking wtf?? Turns out the 4th placed team won, but cheated anyway and was disqualified leaving *no* champion at all, leaving me thinking even more wtf??

 

[Jaffa Cake]

Not a very good one if you ask me that lets the 6th placed team get promoted ahead of the 3rd, 4th and even 5th (even though that's how Arsenal got promoted).

Well, there was no play-off back when it happened to Arsenal – that system wasn't introduced for another 70 years or so. Rather than winning a play-off they were 'elected' to be promoted ahead of, of all teams, Tottenham Hotspur. There were dark rumours that the controversial decision was due to bribery and corruption behind the scenes rather than any merit on the part of the Gunners, but no wrong doing was ever proven beyond doubt...

When we were promoted to the Premier League - courtesy of the play-offs, of course – I remember reading a column in one of the papers where the writer was decrying the play-off system as useless, using our promotion as clear proof of the fact. It should be automatic promotion only, he wrote – how can we use a system that allows clubs like Hull [sic] to sneak into the Premier League through the back door ahead of more deserving teams?

Hmm. Had our intrepid scribe actually bothered to check the 2007-08 Championship table he'd have seen that we finished third, so under his preferred system we'd have gone up automatically anyway. Heh. The buffoon.

Anyway, Blackpool are the worst team in Premier League history and will be relegated by with less points than Derby County™. I reckon we'll be reading and hearing that from the media a fair bit over the next few weeks...

 

[awmazz]

I should have included inverted commas around the word in the " ..that's how Arsenal got 'promoted' " bit. A wise decision it was though as Arsenal has never been relegated since.

An interesting stat, with Brom coming up after Burnley going down, this season equals last season's of having 7 of the surviving original 11 teams now in the Premier League.

But then what do stats mean - statistically Blackpool has never been relegated from the Premier League. The one stat I would like to see broken is that of Man Utd finishing in the top 3 in every one of the 18 years since the Premier League began. Redknapp reckons Tottenham can win it or thereabouts this season... so top 3 = London clubs, with Man Utd finishing 4th ahead of Man City..

 

[swiftaw]

An interesting stat, with Brom coming up after Burnley going down, this season equals last season's of having 7 of the surviving original 11 teams now in the Premier League.

Also interestingly, 9 of the original 11 have played in the premier league. Notts County and Preston are the only ones that haven't made it yet.

 

[pachyderm]

best so far, imho, is the new PSV home kit.

top 3 for me.

 

[Jaffa Cake]

The Wrexham shirt is a standard shirt from Umbro's teamwear range, as nice as it is – they call it the 'Winchester'. If you want an unbadged shirt identical to the one you picture it'll only set you back £13.50 direct from Umbro – for a badged version from the club it'll probably cost you three times that.

My personal favourites so far have been the West Brom and Sunderland home shirts, the horrific sponsor on the former not withstanding. In saying that pachyderm, your three choices all carry the prestigious Cake seal of approval for kit-based niceness.