Midweek Mashup – Arsenal, 2022

Update on Wednesday: We might be deprived of seeing this mix after all:

Update on Thursday: It has finally been confirmed that Arsenal will wear white shorts, but with black trim:

Arsenal travel to Eindhoven to face PSV in their penultimate Europa League group game and it got us wondering as to what they might wear.

Obviously, the home shirts were not a viable option – Uefa are somewhat stricter than the FA were for the 1936 FA Cup final when the Gunners took on Sheffield United – while the pink third strip would make for a bad blend against the home side’s red and white stripes.

That left just the black second strip.

Last weekend, Arsenal wore it in its default format against Southampton (right) but, as Uefa tend not to allow shorts-clashes (unlike 2002 and 2007, when Arsenal played PSV) but as PSV favour black shorts at home, a different combination would be required.

Against Manchester United and Brentford, the grey socks from one of Arsenal’s goalkeeper kits were used.

The idea of using the shorts from that strip (left) might have appealed to those of us who enjoy unusual mashups – or there might have been the possibility of PSV being asked to wear their white alternative shorts – instead we will have the mismatching combination of the home shorts used with the black shorts and socks.

As the graphic shows, Arsenal have change shorts for the pink third kit (the club’s women’s team wore them against Liverpool at the weekend) so the lack of alternatives for the second strip is unusual. One other thing that the Uefa image does is confirm that the black kit is available for use by Arsenal goalkeepers, as the 2020-21 and 2021-22 change strips were.

Arsenal wearing their away shirt with home shorts is something of a tradition dating back to the club’s first stint with adidas but it also happened during their tenure with Nike – in 1999 against Barcelona and 2002 against Roma (the same season where they didn’t have to change against PSV).