Category Archives: World Cup Classics

World Cup Classics – France, 1978: allez les verts et blancs

18 Monday Jun 2018

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  • Last week marked the 40th anniversary of France having to wear green and white stripes against Hungary at the World Cup. He’s a look at what transpired, written by Jess Cully
  • For another game where Hungary and their opponents both emerged on to the pitch in white shirts, see here

Football anoraks of a certain age like myself will remember fondly how the French turned out in a green and white strip, some players with wrong numbers, for their final group game with Hungary in Mar del Plata at the 1978 World Cup, a match that was meaningless as both teams were already out. Here is the full story of how it happened.

In 1978, much of the world still watched TV in black and white so wherever possible televised football matches had to be contested by one team in light strips and one in dark. With that in mind, in February 1978, FIFA wrote to the French and Hungarian FAs to advise them that Hungary should play the World Cup game against France in their red home strip, and France should wear their white away kit.

However, in late April or early May, FIFA changed their minds, and decided that France should wear their blue home strip and Hungary their white away kit.

Alas, FFF official Henri Patrelle gave this communiqué only a cursory glance, binned it and forgot about it. So, come the day of the match, both teams turned up in Mar del Plata with only their white strips.

No-one guessed anything was up until the French took to the field to warm up, blue tracksuit tops over their white shirts. Their opponents were already out on the pitch – in a full red tracksuit, so even their white socks were covered.

Henri Michel noticed something suspiciously white-looking under their tops.

“White shirt?” Michel asked Peter Torocsik.

“White shirt,” came the reply.

The French officials were asked where their blue shirts were. The answer was 400km away in Buenos Aires.

A couple of World Cup gophers were rapidly despatched in a car to ask a local football side, Club Atlético Kimberley, if they had a set of dark strip to lend the French. Green and white stripes were, and are, their colours and they agreed.

France-1978-green-stripes-Kimberly-Hungary-01

Here is where the story gets interesting from a squad numbers point of view – the Kimberley shirts had no numbers.

Aside from the goalkeepers, who wore 1, 21 and 22, France’s squad was numbered in positional blocks – 2-8 for defenders, 9-15 for midfielders and 16-20 for attackers (including wingers), though with one exception as striker Marc Berdoll wore 14 when really he should have been 15 with Michel Platini 14.

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France’s lineout with the players’ World Cup squad numbers

It wasn’t until the 1994 World Cup that teams were allowed to have all of the non-starting players on the bench, and so, for the Hungary match, France’s squad of 16 included Bernard Lacombe (17), Dominique Rocheteau (18), Didier Six (19 – though you’d think coach Michel Hidalgo would have given him 6) and Olivier Rouyer (20).

There were only 14 outfield shirts in the Kimberley set. They didn’t mind the French ironing numbers onto their shirts, but they drew the line at having gaps in their numeration. The shirts would have to be numbered 2-11 and 13-16 (in Argentina, 12 is for the substitute goalkeeper).

So, after kick-off was held up for 40 minutes for the numbers to be ironed on, the teams finally took to the field, with Rocheteau wearing 7, Rouyer 11, and Claude Papi, whose squad number was 12, wearing 10. On the subs’ bench, Six wore 16 and Lacombe, though an attacking midfielder, had to wear 2 as it was the only remaining shirt. He wasn’t brought on so we didn’t get to see a number 2 making surging forward runs from the middle. The French blue away shorts had numbers, so these five players turned out with one number on their shirt and another on their shorts.

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France’s lineout with the shirt numbers worn against Hungary

The French players weren’t put off by these shenanigans – they won 3-1. Some of the Kimberley players were in the crowd, flushed with pride at their shirts seeing World Cup action. Given the craze for referencing old kits with modern launch, perhaps Nike might one day give France a green and white away shirt?

 

World Cup Classics – Australia, 1974

14 Monday May 2018

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While they don’t feature on the Australian flag, green and gold are the country’s colours when it comes to sport.

First adopted by the country’s cricketers in 1899, they were donned by Australian Olympians in 1912 and the football/soccer team followed suit in 1924, a few years ahead of rugby league and rugby union. Light blue had been used by the football team before then.

In 1965, white socks were adopted and would remain until 1989, a period taking in the Socceroos’ first appearance at the World Cup in 1974. A classic 1970s style v-neck insert collar was used at the time, but there would be a few notable changes for the tournament in West Germany.

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You’re not seeing things – that kit does indeed have the Umbro double diamond and adidas’s famous three-stripe sleeve markings.

Thanks to Simon Shakeshaft, we know that adidas had an agreement with FIFA to underwrite the costs of the World Cup and showcase their new branding. The Australian Soccer Federation had a deal with Umbro, who were in league with adidas at the time. They were the German firm’s sole footwear distributor in the UK while providing textiles expertise in return.

Adidas wanted a presence in the Australian market and the shirt three stripes gave them a profile. The shirt was actually an Umbro airtex jersey carrying the double-diamond logo with three stripes added down the sleeves – in contravention of the rules for the competition, which stated that only type of brading was allowed on each kit element.

Special permission was granted to Australia and Umbro took inspiration with their own diamond sleeve taping later in the decade.

For the game against Chile, who also had white socks, Australia switched to green hosiery.

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The campaign for white socks to return was started in the Sydney Morning Herald in 2011, and they did for the 2014 World Cup. However, it was the ‘proper’ Umbro style that Nike replicated rather than the adidas/Umbro hybrid.

World Cup Classics – France, 1986

23 Monday Apr 2018

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Trying to follow the great kit worn in winning Euro 84 was a tall order for adidas and France ahead of the 1986 World Cup in Mexico.

Rather than aping or refreshing that design – something they would do a lot, perhaps overdo, in the following two decades, they gave white a little more prominence and used a template which, to our knowledge, wasn’t used by anyone else (bar Hereford United 😉 ).

France-1986-1989-adidas-maillot-domicile-World-Cup-Mexico-01

The change kit was simply a re-colouring of the same template, something sadly seen less and less nowadays.

France-1986-1989-adidas-maillot-exterieur-World-Cup-Mexico-01-01

France finished joint-top of their group, losing out to the USSR on goal difference, meaning a last-16 clash with Italy, the white kit worn in a 2-0 win.

Brazil were then seen off following a penalty shootout in the quarter-finals but, as in 1982, France’s tournament ended at the semi-final stage against West Germany, losing 2-0.

The kit would remain until the end of the unsuccessful qualifying campaign for World Cup 90. The socks were updated during the strip’s lifetime, while the long-sleeved version differed in that it didn’t have the white strip below the red on the arms.

France-1989-adidas-maillot-Arsenal-01

World Cup Classics – Italy, 1938

17 Tuesday Apr 2018

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Italy went into the 1938 World Cup in France as the holders, and would go on to become the first country to retain the title.

Having beaten Norway after extra time in their first-round game (the competition was straight knockout), they advanced to meet the hosts in the quarter-finals at Stade Olympique de Colombes in Paris.

Obviously, due to both countries having blue as a first-choice colour, a draw had to take place to see who would change, with Italy drawing the short straw.

Conventional wisdom has it that Benito Mussolini ordered that an all-black kit be worn, for the first and only time. While it’s not hard to imagine the influence of il duce in the switch away from white second shirts, black had been used against the French in 1935 and also in Italy’s successful 1936 Olympic campaign in Berlin.

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The black would prove to be a lucky charm, with Italy winning 3-1 before beating Brazil in the semi-final and then Hungary in the decider.

The late 30s were of course also notable for the outbreak of the second World War and, unsurprisingly, the black shirts fell out of fashion after the fall of fascism, with white restored as the back-up option.

World Cup Classics – USA, 1950

09 Monday Apr 2018

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Having boycotted the previous three World Cups, England had high hopes as they travelled to Brazil take part for the first time in 1950.

They were 3-1 favourites to win the competition outright. So confident were they that Stanley Matthews was held back for their opening group game, a 2-0 win over Chile, having joined the squad late, with big warm-up victories over Italy and Portugal recorded in his absence.

The England selectors opted to choose the same 11 for their second outing against the United States, who had lost 3-1 against Spain, their seventh straight defeat. Their coach Bill Jeffrey described his team as “sheep ready to be slaughtered” ahead of the meeting in Belo Horizonte.

With both countries preferring white shirts with dark shorts and socks, the US won the toss, with England lining out in blue shirts and white shorts. A red diagonal stripe (not a sash, clothes-nerds, as it was broken by the right sleeve – in any case it wasn’t on the back) lifted the US shirt above the mundane and it would become a design held in high regard.

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After early saves from US goalkeeper Frank Borghi, they improbably went ahead through Joe Gaetjens before half-time. While England pressed in the second half, coming closest through a Jimmy Mullen header which looked to be heading in only for a miracle save by Borghi, the Americans held out. It was such a surprise win that, when the result came in on the wires in English newsrooms, it was assumed in some quarters that it should have read England 10 USA 1.

Shell-shocked, England lost their remaining game 1-0 to Spain while the US went down 5-2 against Chile, but in any case only one team qualified for the four-team final round – Spain would draw with eventual champions Uruguay and then lose to Brazil and Sweden.

In terms of the game’s influence on kits, Nike have periodically drawn upon the style, with near-replicas worn as third shirts in 2003 (albeit with navy instead of red) and 2004, as well as 2007 red away and then tonally for the 2010 World Cup home, while the away was navy with white. If you were being really brave, you could say adidas gave a nod to it in 1985 and again in 1991, though both were template designs.

For England, it largely meant the end of darker (i.e. royal or navy, not sky) blue shirts for more than half a century. Red replaced it as the back-up, though partly out of necessity as the next time they had to change was against Argentina. Blue was used again Peru in 1959, but it wasn’t until September 2011, and the launch of a navy shirt, that they reverted back to something similar to their historical second-choice colour.

World Cup Classics – Mexico, 1998

27 Tuesday Mar 2018

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I’ll be honest, I had to look up exactly how far Mexico went in the 1998 World Cup.

I’m sure, like many around my age, the memory which came instantly to mind on recalling their performance was the Cuauhtemiña trick, brought to a wider audience by winger Cuauhtémoc Blanco – where two defenders could be evaded by trapping the ball between his ankles and jumping through the gap.

Of course, adding to the memorability was the kit, produced by ABA Sport, which featured a version of the Aztec Calendar across the shirt. It was certainly love-or-hate, but the passage of time has definitely helped it gain a cult status.

Mexico wore their home kit in their opener, a 3-1 win over South Korea, and their exit, the 2-1 last-16 loss to Germany. Just in case the pattern didn’t give away which team was wearing the shirt, as well as the crest the Mexicans had their flag on the right shoulder and the country name just above the number.

The swirling shorts stripes were quite nice, but the flag and ‘Mexico’ added to the busy-ness. We generally like horizontal stripes on socks but the mass of white lines at the bottom seemed out of place.

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The away strip followed the same style, though with red as the secondary colour and green almost absent from the shirt. The only time it was worn in its intended format – with green shorts – was by goalkeeper Jorge Campos in the South Korea game, though.

Despite red shirts v green shirts being allowed in that match, Mexico changed against Belgium and the Netherlands. There was a sock-clash to sort against Belgium, but green-white-white would have sufficed. Against the Dutch, both sides were in white shorts (that happened as well when the Netherlands played South Korea, who wore blue-white-blue).

 

Making something of a mockery of the fact that Mexico wore white in their latter two group games was that fact that Campos wore the home shirt. While he was provided with two bespoke kits, blue and yellow, the netminder – who had provided a sensory overload at USA 94 and sometimes moonlit as a striker – opted to pair the shorts from those outfits with the green top – yellow against Belgium and blue against Holland – and white away socks.

 

Mexico came from 2-0 down to draw with the Netherlands, Luis Hernández scoring an injury-time equaliser which meant they finished level on points though they had a worse goal difference.

As a result, Germany were the second-round opponents and, with Campos unable to wear the away shirt, one of the ‘proper’ goalkeeper tops – a badge-engineered Nike offering – finally saw some action.

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https://twitter.com/marqo51/status/978685884567494656

World Cup Classics no. 3 – Netherlands change kit, 2006

20 Tuesday Mar 2018

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Whenever the England national team’s kit is discussed, there is a variation on Godwin’s Law in that, eventually, somebody will proffer the view that the kit should white and red because they are the colours of St George’s Flag.

Inevitably, the next response will cite examples where the strip doesn’t follow the flag, such as Italy, Germany and the Netherlands.

The latter’s nickname is Oranje, it being the historic national colour, relating to the ruling House of Orange, with the ‘Prince’s Flag‘, a horizontal orange, white and blue tricolour, having been in use before being replaced by the ‘Statenvlag‘.

Orange and white have been the favoured colours – black crept in in the 1970s as a trim – and while there were some dalliances with blue change shirts in the late 1990s and early 2000s, generally the colours of the home shirt were reversed.

For the 2006 World Cup though, Nike opted for something different, as they looked to the past. On the primary kit, the addition of blue socks harked back to the 1930s and referenced the Prince’s Flag, though in the World Cup they ended up wearing all-orange in their group games against Serbia and Montenegro, Ivory Coast and Argentina.

A second-placed finish behind Argentina meant a last-16 tie with Portugal and a first outing for the change strip. While white remained as the base colour, a sash in the flag colours was a nod to the kit worn in the country’s first-ever international, against Belgium in 1905.

Interestingly, the sash was also repeated on the back of the left sock, but not the right.

Netherlands-2006-Nike-away-World-Cup-01

Sadly for the Dutch, a goal from Maniche in an ill-tempered game dubbed The Battle of Nuremburg ended their interest in the competition, but they would reach the final and semi-finals respectively in the next two World Cups. The country is currently going through a low period football-wise, meaning they won’t be in Russia this summer.

The white, red and blue away kit theme must have proven popular as it has been repeated twice since, in 2010 and 2013. Since 2004, their only white kit with orange accents came in 2015.

World Cup Classics no. 2 – Belgium, 1982

05 Monday Mar 2018

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At the end of last week’s first feature in this series, the Sweden 1994 away kit, we mentioned how the Swedes were prevented from having a white change strip for the 2002 competition, and this week’s entry wouldn’t be allowed nowadays either.

Apart from England, Admiral also supplied Belgium for the 1982 World Cup and they made sure everybody knew about it.

As well as the ‘normal’ applications of their logo on the right breast of the shirt and the left leg of the shorts, it was also repeated along thick yellow stripes which travelled from the arms down the sides of the shirt and on to the shorts (the same route as the Coventry and Wales ‘tramlines’). Such brand exposure far exceeds modern limits.

There is a possibility that, if you were to ask the casual fan what the Belgian kit was for the World Cup in Spain, they might say red shirts, white shorts and red socks. That’s what was worn in their opening game, a 1-0 win against Argentina at the Nou Camp, a game which provided an iconic – and somewhat misleading – image of Diego Maradona and six Belgian players (click here for the real story behind it).

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The white shorts were from the away kit, which followed the same design as the red strip, and the change must have been one of those illogical FIFA decisions due to a perceived shorts-clash.

For their other two Group 3 games, another 1-0 win over El Salvador and a 1-1 draw with Hungary, Belgium were in the all-red which had superseded the red-black-red look. Note how the red shorts had a different number font to the white.

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That progressed them to the 12-team second round, where countries were drawn in groups of three.  In their first Group A game, Belgium played Poland, who were in their usual white-red-white but, while this was obviously more of a shorts-clash than the Argentina tie, no change was mandated.

A Ziggy Boniek hat-trick gave Poland a 3-0 win to put Belgium on the back foot and they were out after a 1-0 loss to the USSR – though, as they won the toss for colours, it meant they exited the competition having played all five games in their traditional red shirts.

With Admiral in financial trouble, Belgium soon returned to adidas, who gave them an interesting design featuring an argyle pattern – something of which we shall see more this summer.

 

World Cup Classics no. 1 – Sweden away, 1994

26 Monday Feb 2018

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Is it too early for World Cup fever? We don’t think so.

During the World Cup itself, we’ll be tracking the kits worn in each game – both teams, goalkeepers and officials – and to build up the anticipation, we’ll be retrospective versions for two previous competitions.

We’re not ignoring the other 18 World Cups either though as, each Monday evening, we’ll focus on a classic kit from one of them. First up is the white Sweden away kit worn as they finished third at USA 94.

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Typically, the Swedes had had blue as an alternative choice – like when they met Brazil in 1990 and wore this excellent kit – but presumable the effects of the heat of an American summer on Swedish heads played a part in this new departure.

As with Italia 90, Sweden were in the game group as Brazil but they had first choice when they met in Detroit.

After seeing off Saudi Arabia in the last 16, Sweden met Romania in the quarter-finals. As the ‘away’ team, Sweden changed, but because of FIFA’s aversion to dark colours against dark colours and light against lights, Romania wore red.

Sweden won on penalties after an entertaining game to advance to another clash with Brazil, and it was a similar situation, all-blue against all-white.

A 1-0 defeat meant the end of Sweden’s journey but they secured third place with a 4-0 play-off win against Bulgaria.

They missed out on qualification for the 1998 World Cup but made it back for 2002. They intended to once again have a white change shirt in Japan and South Korea, but a late FIFA intervention meant that blue was worn instead.