It’s not generally the done thing to flag the use of a fourth-choice goalkeeper shirt – we had to do the digging on Arsenal’s instances ourselves, for example – but Liverpool must have known that something special was happening.
These have been Alisson Becker’s options this season:
Seemingly, Uefa had determined that the yellow and green kits would both have clashed with Barcelona’s luminous change kit and presumably the pink strip – worn at the Nou Camp – wasn’t allowed alongside Liverpool’s red home kit, though they have appeared together in the Premier League.
The colour for the new strip was described as ‘alloy’, or silver to us mere mortals. We had expected something the same as that used by Costa Rica’s Keylor Navas at the World Cup last year and Celtic’s Craig Gordon this season, but instead a plain kit was produced.
Of course, as Jim Hearson pointed out on Twitter, Liverpool’s silver outfield third kit could have been used and there is an Anfield precedent for something like that, though only in a three-decades-old pre-season team picture.
As we all know, Liverpool won 4-0 to reach the final, ensuring that the kit will be held in high regard. It follows a tradition of Liverpool goalkeeping rarities stretching back to the 1970s, something we will look at in the next week or so.
