Russia 5 Saudi Arabia 0
The hosts began on a great note, recording the biggest win in an opening game.
Like so many other adidas teams, they have been given retro stylings, though oddly the design it references was only used by the USSR at the 1988 Olympics. Blue doesn’t feature on the shirt or shorts but is relatively prominent on the socks, helping to create a Russian flag effect. The team’s shirts also featured a small inscription with game details between the adidas logo and crest.
Saudi Arabia’s home kit is all-white so there was a shorts-clash to solve but, rather than wearing white-green-white, they wore their entire change kit, despite the fact that Fifa have been reluctant to allow red shirts v green shirts in the past.
When the away shirt was launched, the ‘KSA’ below the crest was in white, but now it’s dark green. The plainness and the simple number font give it something of an ‘unlicensed team from Pro Evo look.
Both goalkeepers wore their respective kit-makers’ primary templates.
Egypt 0 Uruguay 1
As far as we can see, the thought-process was thus – both sides had black socks on their first-choice kit, so Uruguay changed, but then that created a white shorts-clash, meaning Egypt looked like Manchester United at Goodison Park. Two smart looks, but still overkill.
Uruguay goalkeeper Fernando Muslera opted to wear tights under his shorts and socks, while the white text under the World Cup logo doesn’t show up great on a yellow referee’s shirt.
Russia 3 Egypt 1
A result which effectively qualified the hosts and eliminated Egypt, with Russia wearing their darker red away socks. Egypt’s away is the Condivo template, favoured by many countries, featuring stripes of varying width – similar to the adidas goalkeeper shirts but with smaller squares.
Having had to wear blue against Saudi Arabia, Russia goalkeeper Igor Akinfeev was able to wear his bespoke green kit.
Uruguay 1 Saudi Arabia 0
Uruguay’s home kit features a tonal version of the Sol de Atlántida monument, with the an upper body panel in a lighter shade.
Uruguay 3 Russia 0
What was a battle for top spot ended up being fairly one-sided. Russia wore their away shirts – white with random petrol-blue squares – but alternative white shorts and socks rather than the blue shorts and red socks which were intended to be used.
Saudi Arabia 2 Egypt 1
Both teams in away kits. Saudi Arabia used a third different goalkeeper – Yasser Al-Mosailem joining and Abdullhal Al-Mayouf and Mohammed Al-Owais in getting game-time.
At the other end of the field, Essam El-Hadary became the oldest player to play in a World Cup and he saved a penalty but a last-minute Saudi goal earned them third place.