The idea of women’s teams having distinct kits from their male counterparts is nothing out of the ordinary now – and the move from white shorts may even accelerate the bifurcation even more.
It was not always like that, though Germany were certainly ahead of the pack in coming up with bespoke offerings for their women – the 1999 adidas catalogue shows a nice purpose-made damentrikots, for instance.
The fact that the Women’s World Cup and European Championship were placed in odd-numbered years, 12 months after the respective men’s events, made it easier to stagger designs and create distinction between the kit sets.
Certainly, we’d place the women’s 2005 offering higher in our ratings than the men’s 2004 edition. However, while the men’s move to a red change shirt had been mirrored, the women’s backup option lacked the presence of any gold and so looked more like something that would be used by Austria or Switzerland. Thankfully, the next set would work better.
For the 2006 World Cup, which the country hosted, the men’s team were kitted out in two nice designs from the adidas Teamgeist range, both based on the style known as United. They were able to wear the first-choice kit in all seven games they played, only being eliminated at the semi-final stage.
A year later and the Germany women would go all the way to World Cup glory in China – see here for the #1to11ify series relating to WWC finals – and they were clad in outfits that might, at first glance, looked to have been the same as the men, they were instead based on adidas’s new designs.
The home kit used the Onore template, while the away was known as Golpe – as with the men, one sleeve was black but on the opposite side. The default white shorts did not appear at the tournament and instead, when they played England, they used the home set with the red shirts and socks, which worked just as well.
The gender-split would continue right through the 2010s – the women’s 2019 shirt arguably a better tribute to the 1988-91 style than the men a year previously – though this year did see a reintegration as both teams wore the same style.
Whether this was a one-off or the start of a trend, we shall see – the upcoming partnership with Nike is another element that may affect this mix.
