It’s taken a while to follow on from part 15 and for that, we apologise.
The 2004-05 season was on that saw three new goalkeeper shirt designs from adidas, with the main one being similar to that used for the new range of outfield jerseys that season.
Launched in the lead-up to Euro 2004, the differences between the goalkeeper and outfield styles can be seen with the Milan second-choice top for custodians and the identically-coloured third kit – which, incidentally, was never worn competitively, which was one time fewer than its 2003-04 predecessor.
Milan, like the other top-tier adidas contracts, had bespoke offerings, as we shall see. The three main generic versions of the design, as used by Greece – the eventual champions – and Lativa at Euro 2004, were black, silver and golden yellow.
Five of the 16 countries at the tournament wore adidas and the other three – France, Germany and Spain – had colour-schemes that were unique to them.
The France one was black but differed from the standard style in that the shards were yellow, while the other two were blue. Germany’s, trimmed with white, unusually had the federation crest on the right breast and the adidas logo on the left, while Spain’s had red-yellow-red adidas striping.
Oliver Kahn often wore a blue shirt for Bayern Munich as well as Germany, emulating his predecessor Sepp Maier, and in 2004-05 he had exactly the same shirt at club level (albeit with logos and crest in their more usual places) as he did for his country. For Bayern, he tended to wear the gold-trimmed shorts from the club’s away kit.
Along with the gold shirt shown above, Milan had a green primary jersey and a little-used grey third, all three with red-black-red striping.
Newcastle United had green too, but with white stripes, while Real Madrid had a pair of goalkeeper kits rendered in exclusive palettes.
We had assumed that it was a situation like Chelsea’s goalkeeper kits of 2006-07, two shirts whose colours mirrored each other, but instead it more of a Dallas Cowboys-style scenario.
While illustrating the silver shorts, we wondered why they had white trim when the silver shirt had none – on looking closer, we saw that the secondary colour on the silver shirt was navy rather than purple and that the two silvers were different.
As far as we can see, Iker Casillas only wore the shorts from the purple kit with the silver shirt and sock: we presume that the default shorts were navy but have been unable to find proof.
Any other usage of this design at club level were in the black, silver or yellow – Fabien Barthez wore a red kit for Marseille but it was a teamwear version of the outfield design. However, there were two other goalkeeper styles seen around the continent.
Turkish side Fenerbahçe had blue and silver versions of an offering that had a pattern giving a feather-like effect, while Dnipro of Ukraine had it in burgundy.
That, we thought, was that but then, with the article nearly ready to go, another oddity surfaced, one with a Spirographesque effect on the front.
The fact that Fiorentina were in Serie B when they partnered with adidas in 2003 perhaps meant that the two-year alliance went under the radar.
They were back in the top flight for 2004-05, however, when the blue iteration of this design was seen; while the research was not exhaustive, the only other one we’ve seen was a burnt-orange and navy, used by Club Brugge.
Japan had two goalkeeper kits that were bespoke versions of the “main” adidas design for 2004.
Whilst the black version was similar to the regular version worn by many teams, it was unique in that it had a different shadow pattern and the same grip dots pattern carried over from the 2002 goalkeeper jerseys…
https://cdn.footballkitarchive.com/2025/06/05/ti6mGQ0v2S2F28x.jpg
The yellow version was more unique, with grey trim and black adidas “spike” striping
https://www.sporting-heroes.net/content/thumbnails/00234/23259-zoom.jpg
Whilst most teams with a unique colour scheme also used one of the standard colour schemes (black, yellow, silver) as a second choice, I noticed Iker Casillas wore the yellow shirt at Euro 2004 with what appeared to be bespoke shorts and socks (which had the Spanish flag on them)
https://media.gettyimages.com/id/50958801/photo/faro-portugal-iker-casillas-of-spain-celebrates-during-the-spain-v-russia-group-a-match-in-the.jpg?s=612×612&w=gi&k=20&c=8fhQNvmEvqMRTyACjBGMoxDdGBTP1V-XiVMq2da9IM8=
Finally, the “Spirograph” shirt did have a third colour scheme – my memory wasn’t playing tricks!
It was dark green, with navy circles, but with black sleeves and back
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/E3kAAOSwut1mmWoI/s-l1600.webp
Ah yes, part 16! I was impatient to read it ; thanks 😉
Hi! Long-time reader, first-time commenter here. Thanks for the amazing work! I’m a huge fan of the 2003-2006 kit era, also corresponding the fascinating PES 3-6 era.
The distinction of the tone on those Real Madrid goalkeeper shorts really blew my mind. I found what seems to be a third goalkeeper kit in navy, though I’m not sure if it’s just the purple one with higher saturation. Either way, silver shorts!
https://cloud10.todocoleccion.online/carteles-futbol/tc/2012/06/10/32103474_100602.jpg
Also, this pic of a France keeper may suggest what would have been the navy shorts for Real Madrid..
https://www.footballkitarchive.com/es/france-2004-gk-2-kit/226747/
Last, I remember Argentina having exclusive goalkeeper kits. I found one that is the black version, similar to the regular one, but with sky blue trim. Another one is a sky blue kit.
https://www.sporting-heroes.net/football/argentina/german-lux-6813/juegos-olimpicos-2004-final_a22709/
https://www.gettyimages.es/detail/fotograf%C3%ADa-de-noticias/german-lux-argentina-goalkeeper-fotograf%C3%ADa-de-noticias/660834592
It’s a slightly overexposed picture of the regular purple jersey in my view. I do think that for adidas’ top-tier national teams, their alternative goalkeeper kits were the “catalogue” colour options but with bespoke matching shorts and socks, just like Spain did for the amber/navy shirt… which would explain the alternative France kit.
Interesting find on that second Argentina jersey, at first glance it looked like the silver “catalogue” option, but the adidas trim looked like black. I do note that Oliver Kahn wore a somewhat similar alternative shirt for Germany too which looked like the same shade of sky blue/silver
https://c8.alamy.com/comp/D3J5T7/dpa-german-goalkeeper-oliver-kahn-lifts-his-arms-after-his-team-scored-D3J5T7.jpg
Also, Germán Lux also wore an amber shirt that also looked like the “catalogue” shirt at first glance, but the front pattern was noticeably different!
https://www.tfortarget.com/image/cache/catalog/0886/0005/gettyimages-53152646-2048×2048-800×1050.jpg