What's in a name?

Would you still support your team if they ran out wearing hessian sack cloth rather than some rather stylish and fancy design of shirt created out of the latest man made breathable material?
Of course you would, it's still your team, you just probably wouldn't be buying replicas for the family.

It's only a football kit, some you like some you don't, it's the players wearing them and the badge on the shirt that counts. So why do so many fully grown men get so excited and sometimes extremely agitated about football kits, especially when most of us are far too old and a little too chubby around the mid drift to actually look good in one anyway?

Whilst the rest of the country are getting either emotional over the Paralympics or worried, nervous and fidgety over the last days of the transfer window, it's a different piece of news which this week caught my attention. In the words of someone a football shirt really wouldn't suit, Peter Griffin, this really grinds my gears. Yes, i deliberately referenced from across the pond.

England football kits could soon be adorned with one of the most American of all logos, no not the golden arches but the Nike swoosh.

Umbro, the kit suppliers to the national team, from Manchester were bought out by Nike four years ago. Nike however wanted to keep the name for their refreshing 'tailored in Britain' range.
Depressingly on Tuesday Nike announced they are selling the Umbro name, and the client list of course isn't part of the deal.

Nike always conjours up pictures of basketball to me, and with Converse in their locker as well, we have baseball, that other great worldwide sport. Be content in the knowledge that with the swoosh we're getting ourselves a part of everything that made the good old US of A great for our pound notes.

Just look at Charlton. We've had 'the Yanks in' for only a handful of months and they've already taken over the club shop and re branding it as a 'Nike store'. Don't be surprised if in a year or so you'll be able to buy the latest Jordan air's or whatever they are called as part of your match day experience. I don't believe heritage is high on Nike's agenda, either in SE7 or on the national stage.

Umbro first produced the kits for England in the fifties. Before that St Blaise, and for a couple of years a company called Hope Brothers had the contract. Shirts were a simple white and plain in design although blue and red would appear on the shorts and socks from time to time. The shirt was a sacred canvas though, remaining unadulterated whoever got their hands on it, right through to the early seventies. Enter Admiral.

Admiral won the contract in 1974. The Leicester based firm first came to the public attention with Leeds United and were the first manufacturer to adorn the England kit with their own logo alongside the three lions. They produced kits for their home town club, Leicester City and along with Spurs and the greatest of all Wales kits, the tramlines, made Admiral THE kit manufacturer of the seventies.
As you can see from the likes of Keegan and Francis above, they threw a splash of red and white onto the sleeves and collar, to me the greatest England shirt since Geoff Hurst scored his hat trick at Wembley.

Considering how well remembered the Admiral shirts are with a certain generation, it's amazing to think in the nine years they were the official supplier, they only really had the two designs.
Emlyn Hughes models here their second creation, a personal favourite which will always be associated with the World Cup in Spain back in 1982. Would this open the floodgates for the more creative of designers to plaster stars or polka dots on the national teams shirts? We were less than a decade away from the craziest ever period of football kit design, research what Beaver International did for Barnsley in the 89-90 season to see what i mean. Thankfully after the golden days of Admiral, Umbro were to get their hands back on England.

Umbro made it all the way through the late 80's and early 90's without once turning to drugged up art students or a kaleidoscope for inspiration. Well, maybe a school geometry set for some of the fine detailing on the red away shirts of the day but we'll gloss over those.

In time for the homecoming of football they played their trump card with a gem of a design for Euro 96. This was so classy it didn't even have the diamond logo on anything other than the socks. It proudly spelt out the word 'Umbro' above the centrally placed three lions crest. It was a bold statement that Umbro and England go together like port and stilton, fish and chips, Dave and repeats, Palace and losing. sorry, couldn't resist that one......

Other than the awful little crosses in red, blue and purple(???) across the shoulders a year or two ago, none of Umbro's creations have been too adventurous. Dropping blue from the latest offering did get tongues wagging as to the lack of attention to history, but other than that each kit will have a special meaning for all of us as we can tie them in with different World Cups and European Championships from recent times. All emotional, all full of disappointment, but all full of pride.

My own personal favourite saw the single red stripe which was worn by Beckham and co for 'that' free kick against Greece. Like i say, we all remember each one fondly.
Terry Butcher's blood over the crew neck in '89, Beckham getting sent off against Argentina at the '98 world cup wearing arguably Umbro's boldest effort. All gems, all engraved in our minds.

Will Nike, or Nikeee as i refuse to pronounce it, generate the same emotions as i felt researching and typing this? Umbro are in essence, and have been for a while, the same company. Who knows if the designers will stay with the parent company, will the new owners only be buying the badge and the name?

It is just a name on a shirt at the end of the day, but it's been the same name for thirty years. I don't really do change, especially when it involves an England kit especially designed for the world series........

FADS

My knowledge of DIY superstores, or for that matter, small little local hardware stores is, I'm proud to say, very limited. I do remember a branch of FADS in the high street though back in the early eighties.
This is where my father just had to shop for paint and wallpaper. Well, i was of the opinion that if it's good enough for Allan Simonsen it's good enough for us.

My dad, having no interest in football, obviously declined the use of my helpful eleven year old logic and bought his domestic happiness and brownie points in the cheapest emporium available to him.
The point is, only decorating anoraks and Charlton Athletic supporters will look back at this forgotten high street name with fondness.

I'm not really one for shirt advertising on the whole though. My first replica shirt was a red Liverpool number as worn by that footballing legend, Emlyn Hughes. This just had a yellow Liver bird and Umbro badge.
Football of course in those days was relatively untouched by the financial evil which has prostituted many clubs to within an inch of their lives. We did have advertising boards, but they were sporadically positioned around the edge of the pitch, Texaco being an example. In those days if you draped your scarf across it stewards didn't demand you remove it and threaten to eject you.
Nowadays you have to hope for an empty area of seating to display your flag or banner across, and even then only if authorised first.

The point is, i could associate with FADS. In the same way we could associate with Crown Paints (Liverpool), Solvite (Watford) or Wrangler (Nottingham Forest). These were brands we could choose to spend our money on over their competitors.
Look at the drinks industry for example. Holsten (Spurs), Ind Coope (Leicester), Guinness (QPR), Skol (Forest again) and my favourite, Newcastle Brown Ale (i so want to type Sunderland).
All these could perhaps persuade supporters to spend their pennies on the product in question. So much so that Tennants sponsor both Celtic and Rangers to avoid one set of fans boycotting the beer rather than be associated with their bitterest of rivals. I believe CR Smith, NTL, and Carling did the same.

I can say from experience that supporters will boycott products due to a rather healthy dislike for all things _________ (enter as appropriate). Throughout the nineties if i needed any media for data storage you can bet your bottom dollar i wasn't buying TDK! And to this day I've never used Churchill for my motor insurance.
Mind you, i never bought a Viglen or Mesh computer either but we'll gloss over that.

It wasn't just the drinks industry, other household names were emblazoned across your bedroom wall on posters pulled from football magazines. If you wanted a new cassette player or even a revolutionary beta max recorder would you choose JVC (Arsenal), Sharp (Manchester United),  or Philips (Manchester City) to go with the Saab you bought the season before?

These were choices we had, but today, and there are exceptions,  it's all lost a bit of that homely feel. There's plenty of on line betting companies which isn't appropriate for youngsters to wear, hence they take the name off junior kits. This of course means your kids shirt isn't the same as his heroes. It does go to show how mainstream and acceptable gambling has become. I've nothing against a little flutter, but once upon a time the pools was the only acceptable face of sporting betting.

Airlines still enjoy maximum publicity with Fly Emirates (Arsenal) and Etihad (Manchester City) seen by millions each week. I hope they fare better than both British Midland (Derby) and British Caledonian (Brighton) did. Personally, the only airline i feel is within my reach is easy jet. Not that I'm boasting or anything you understand.

Then there are those who you have no idea of their wares. Charlton had Redbus, I'm still not sure what i was promoting there. AON (Manchester United), well, I'd have to google it. FxPro (Fulham) again no idea, maybe i just live a very blinkered life. In fact Manchester United have had a theme of late as i haven't a clue what AIG do either. How those millions were wasted on me.

Some of the best sponsors came in for personal reasons. Wet Wet Wet had their name on their hometown club Clydebank, whilst former Housemartin Norman Cook instigated one of the longest of shirt deals with Brighton. During his days as Fat Boy Slim, his record label 'Skint' was the word of choice on all blue and white striped shirts on the south coast.
A great way of making potential muggers think twice.

Recently on reading an article on BEKO fridges catching fire, i wracked my brains to try and remember which poor set of fans may have once been tempted to part with their hard earned on said brand of kitchen white goods. Oh yes, Millwall, that was it.

To summarise then, I'm not totally against shirt sponsorship. Just keep it relative to it's audience. It's the working class man who is going to walk around with the company name on his chest as opposed to those guests enjoying the match in a box sipping champagne and eating prawn sandwiches. They may be influenced on chartered accountants or solicitors, but we're really not that bothered about such things.
Next time Charlton, how about Fullers and a shirt with a London Pride logo on the front?

Nowadays unfortunately we are starting to see the continental trend popping up throughout our leagues of the selling of any space to advertising. The back of shirts, shorts, socks, it won't be long before our players are decked out like formula one cars.
I dread the day Charlton have sponsorship on the back of the shirt, please don't get me started on that..........

'I Was A Teenage Armchair Honved Fan'

Actually it wasn't Honved but another side from Budapest, Ujpest Dozsa. Resplendent in their purple and white stripes they were responsible for many a childhood imaginary team, not to mention frequent winners of my Subbuteo European Cup.
It was of course a knockout competition in those days, the dreadful Champions league still a pipe dream at best.
Half Man Half Biscuit had different allegiances from me and the title is borrowed from their song, so Honved had to stay. They also wrote a song with plenty of Subbuteo references, although rather than Honved, it was Dukla Prague who saw fame in England through that one.

Of course other sides did win my coveted European cup, a trophy which stood as high as at least three of the little players that won it. Another winner was Wisla Krakow from Poland, a club I still strongly support. A couple of years ago we went to Krakow for a long weekend but the team were playing away. The wife would never have allowed me to go anyway but that's beside the point, I got to see their stadium. It's on my bucket list, and one day I'll witness the atmosphere!

From Scotland there is Brechin City, unfortunate in often being losing semi finalists along with Ireland's Shamrock Rovers and Belgium's Lokeren. Then of course there are the mighty Borussia Monchengladbach. In the late seventies they were the Hungarians main challenge for the silver wear.
For English contenders we had the Addicks of course plus Liverpool, a club I kind of supported as a kid. This had nothing to do with their actual success on the field, it was simply that my favourite player Emlyn Hughes was at the heart of their defense.

I was fortunate to have a fair bit of kit and plenty of different sides to choose from, some of them still even had eleven players! I started with a world cup edition, which came with the standard red and blue sides (the reds sorted Charlton and Brechin for me), plus Brazil. Their little legs and faces were painted brown which as young kid I thought was cool. One Brazilian player had his kit and base painted into red and white as Charlton invested in this international superstar!

There was included in this grand edition a scoreboard with just about most the teams you could wish for printed on thin strips of paper. Ujpest Dozsa though was handwritten, by my grandad I believe, on the reverse of somebody else guaranteeing never a meet between the two.
Green fencing surrounded the playing surface with small brown fence posts connecting the panels together. These posts had small holes so you could nail it all in place on a board should you wish. Upon erecting this fencing it soon became apparent I hadn't left enough room for the goalkeepers 'tail' and the architects were called in to make some last minute alterations.

Behind the fencing a large brown and green (the late 70's early 80's Subbuteo certainly had a colour theme going on) grandstand and a corner of uncovered terracing. Joining the two, a straight piece of uncovered terracing meaning from the half way line to the corner it looked impressive. Two clear dugouts, a TV tower and four floodlights (with working batteries) had to try and fill the rest.
For the supporters it was very much like the east terrace at The Valley in the early eighties. I had the twenty five plastic fans the grandstand came with plus maybe one or two more packets of five or ten, I forget, to fill that vast space.
Considering the space each fan had around him it was still a very unsafe environment as my elbow frequently clipped a stand and they all fell forward a few rows. The straight piece of terracing had a tendency to collapse completely although this rarely caused a game to be abandoned. Well, we were all a little tougher and less politically correct in those days.

Never a game went past without at least one player trying to re-enact 'Escape To Victory'. A death defying leap from the table, normally directly after taking a free kick, and the daring little lad was off.
Never fear, they never actually got away. In fact it was like Auschwitz for escaping. No sooner were they fleeing than a large foot came down on them snapping them clean away from their playing base. Similar in many ways to being shot in the back by Germans less than a hundred yards into freedom. The odd couple that stayed on the run for longer would still come to regret their actions once faced with my mum and her hoover.
Looking back I wonder if they were just trying to escape a very scary corner kicker who was a giant of a man, although still probably shorter than the trophy they were competing for. Or maybe it was a rogue player from 'Striker' with that bizarre head you pushed down to kick the ball that put the frighteners on them. It freaked me a little bit!

If I fancied a change of playing surface I would move down from the dining room table to the deep shag of the lounge carpet. The playing surface down there it gave the feel of a boggy Wednesday night pitch at Hereford. Those little players struggled to kick the ball further than about six inches (although in fairness, if put to scale that's still hoofing it up field). If my mum had ironed creases into my pitch it would be even less as the ball would roll uphill then back down again just as it reached a crease my school trousers would have been proud of.

Whatever the playing surface, the tactics would remain the same. Start with a four four two, or some other trusted formation, then end up with all ten outfield players in the opposition penalty area. This gave rise to an American tradition of the time out, a minute to go back to some kind of order on the field of play.

I was very good at playing Subbuteo on my own. My brother, my dad, my grandad and a couple of friends from school would play from time to time but I needed Subbuteo more often than that.
If I was at a crucial stage of the competition I could quite happily spend my day at school day dreaming about that afternoons match. Controlling both sides I guess you could have claimed some kind of match fixing scandal, but I was only nine and still far too innocent to even be aware such things took place.

Some clubs were figments of my imagination although this was very much in my early days of table football. I even remember a team from Tracy Island (I think it may have been Manchester City I used, similar shade of blue you see) competing in one match. The likes of Orient in their 'braces' kit were always going to be too strong for a bunch of part time world savers. Imagination was as important as skill to a young aspiring footballing God.

This wasn't just the beautiful game, it was my beautiful game and complemented all my Panini sticker albums perfectly. Life was so different then. A beer and a sing song with the lads is great, but those days of being a football fanatic as a kid are fondly remembered as some of the greatest.

When I go to heaven I hope there's a Subbuteo set there.