The evolution of adidas goalkeeper shirt designs – Part 2

It’s a little later than planned, but we’re ready to crack on with the newest instalment of our series on adidas goalkeeper shirt designs. Part 1 can be read here.

As mentioned in that piece, the ‘dip-dye’ style lasted from 1977 until 1984, but its prime period of usage was from around 1980-82. Unfortunately, adidas didn’t have a clean progression from design to design, so research hasn’t been easy.

While the previous look reminded us most of Jim Leighton, the horizontal-prinstripe look which came into vogue in 1982 is one we would most associate with Harald ‘Toni’ Schumacher, so imagine the pleasant surprise of discovering that adidas named it after him.

At club level with 1. FC Köln/FC Cologne, Schumacher generally wore a grey version of this kit (left) though the more common blue (right) was what he donned when on international duty.

At the 1982 World Cup, he varied it up, however. The official squad picture showed blue, red and yellow versions (note the yellow has black sleeves), and Schumacher favoured the blue in the first group stage, albeit with white shorts:

Oddly, in the games in the second group stage, against England and Spain, he opted for a plain blue shirt, but for the semi-final against France and subsequent final defeat to Italy, he was back in his eponymous design, though the red rather than the blue.

He retained the mismatching (un-numbered) shorts of the blue version and, at the other end of the field for the semi, France goalkeeper Jean-Luc Ettori had what appeared to be an indentical design. Almost, but not quite, as the gap between the ‘pinhoops’ was wider on Ettori’s shirt (proof here). Presumably, this had something to do with the growing influence of adidas France, under Horst Dassler, son founder Adolf (‘Adi’).

Errori also indulged in some mismatching, with his sleeves dark navy and his shorts black – both with the famous French white-blue-white-red-white striping – and the green shirt he wore earlier in the World Cup the same. It leads us to believe that the yellow, with black sleeves, was the first choice:

While the ‘dip-dye’ style had been worn by the USSR goalkeeper Rinat Dasayev, it was an unbadged edition devoid of the classic ‘CCCP’ on the front, but the accoutrements were present in his new kit. Spain netminder Luis Arconada also used it, albeit with the striping on the sleeves the opposite of that on the shorts and again with a more ’70s’ collar.

For Spain 82, Belgium wore Admiral kits as they were on a hiatus from adidas, but the Red Devils returned in time for the 1984 European Championship in France. Though their goalkeepers would wear the brand-new diagonal tonal-striped look (see Part 3) in the tournament, before that there was a brief appearance for the pinstripes. Like France and Spain, bespoke sleeve striping – yellow-black-yellow-red-yellow – made an appearance.

Oddly, France persisted with the older jersey for the Euros, though to be fair it didn’t stop them winning. Both the French and Belgian shirts had adidas written alongside a smaller trefoil rather than under a larger one.

While the dip-dye was only worn by English clubs in European competition this one wasn’t seen at all, with the opportunities for that perhaps lessened. Likewise, Aberdeen, Northern Ireland and Wales stayed with the dip-dye, so this was exclusively a continental look.

Given the amount of contracts adidas had in Germany, it was most common there. Quite what Bayern Munich goalkeeper Jean-Marie Pfaff was thinking by wearing these aqua shorts and socks, we do not know, however.