On Saturday, Arsenal travel to face Bournemouth in the Premier League.
They will almost certainly be wearing their off-white and redcurrant third kit, which has already been worn on four occasions in the league.
Back in 2002-23, the Gunners travelled to the Vitality Stadium on August 20 – their second away fixture – and also donned their third strip but, despite the early stage in the season, it proved to be its last outing.
With the club having a black second kit last season, the visits to Palace and Bournemouth saw the Gunners in their third strip.
For the first time, they were clad in pink, with navy and cyan as the secondary and tertiary colours respectively. The Ermine pattern seen of the old club crest ran through the fabric tonally.
On the Friday night of the opening weekend of the season, Arsenal wore the kit as they won 2-0 at Palace; 15 days later, a 3-0 win was recorded on the south coast. And, amazingly, that was it for the strip – it didn’t even make it to September.
Apparently manager Mikel Arteta wasn’t a fan – and maybe it was a factor that, in certain lights, the pink looked white. Paired with navy shorts, that would be a no-no from the diehards’ point of view for resembling Tottenham Hotspur.
Whatever the reason, the black shirt was worn for every other game where a colour-clash occurred in that ‘almost’ season for Arsenal, even if, objectively, pink would have worked better at Aston Villa or West Ham United.
Its early retirement meant it passed with a perfect record, five goals scored and none against. Still, it’s hard to see it being held in as high a regard as another unbeaten Arsenal shirt.
