by Alex Bellos
AFTER A FASHION
We change our opinions about the clothes we wear for many reasons, such as when we:
See something we like online, in a magazine, on TV or in a shop
Get bored with what we are wearing and want something new
See a friend wearing something cool and want it too
We say an item of clothing is in fashion if it is very popular, and out of fashion (like Alex’s old flip-flops) if it is unpopular. Clothes can go in and out of fashion very quickly. One day, everyone in class might be wearing red socks and then, a few weeks later, no one will be seen dead in red socks. These fashion moments, when everyone copies the same look, are called trends.
No single person decides what will be in fashion. Rather, it depends on many factors, such as what’s on TV, what’s in the shops, how much money we have, what celebrities (including footballers) are wearing, what new fabrics scientists have invented or even what the weather is like.
TRENDSETTERS
Clothes companies try to create fashions in order to sell more clothes, but this doesn’t always work. Fashion and trends can be hard to predict.
One reason things go in and out of fashion is human psychology. We like to feel that we fit in with our friends, and wearing the same clothes as them is an obvious way to show to the world that we think the same things are important. This is why people love to wear band T-shirts or the kit of their favourite team. Fashion can make you feel like you belong in a group.
But we also like to stand out and show people we are different and special. It’s a delicate balance. No one wants to look like they’ve just copied their mate or a celebrity. Often when an item of clothing becomes too popular, people stop wearing it, since wearing something everyone else is wearing shows a lack of individuality.
Fashion is like a big wheel, with things always coming into fashion, going out of fashion and then coming back into fashion. One day, Alex may even wear his flip-flops again!
FASHION VICTIMS
Footballers are not afraid to try new fashions. Here are some we applaud for trying to stand out:
Dani Alves
The Brazilian loves brightness in his fashion choices, from gold trainers with teddy bears on the tongue to shiny jackets with artistic prints. Our favourite outfit of Dani’s came before a Champions League tie in 2015: a red tuxedo, black bow tie, black shorts and rhinestone-encrusted suede loafers with the image of Batman’s The Joker on them. No wonder he moved to the home of fashion, Paris, in 2017!
Mario Balotelli
When asked who his most stylish teammate was, the Italian replied, “Me.” He specialises in eccentric headgear, from the hoodie with its own Mohawk, to the “glove hat”, a brown-and-yellow woollen beanie with five fingers sticking up along the top of his head.
David Beckham
The former England captain wore a sarong over a pair of black trousers during the 1998 World Cup. He did not regret it, even if people at the time joked: “How can anything that seems so right be sarong?”
Megan Rapinoe
The American midfielder set up her own clothing brand with twin sister Rachael to help people stand up for what they believe in. Rapinoe supports women’s rights, LGBTQ rights and racial justice, and her clothes have messages that sum up her approach to life: be authentic and help others do the same. One of her T-shirts says: Be your best you!
THE KIT CATWALK
Football kits are a brilliant way of seeing how trends keep changing, and often come full circle. Sometimes shirts with collars are in fashion, sometimes V-necks are all the rage and at other times crew necks are the style. Sometimes shorts only just cover players’ bums and at other times they reach down to their knees.
Clubs like updating their kits every year for many reasons. A new, exciting kit design makes players look and feel special, promising a glorious future. (Don’t you always feel good when you put on a brand new shirt?) A new kit also means the club can sell more replica shirts, since fans always want to have the latest item. But kit designs are also responding to wider changes in society. Here we’ll see that the introduction of floodlights, the invention of new fabrics and the rise of the European Cup (now what we call the Champions League) are all things that have changed what footballers wear.
A SHORT HISTORY OF FOOTBALL STRIPS
1900S TO 1930S: KNEESY DOES IT
At the beginning of the last century, tight-fitting shirts with vertical stripes were the big trend. They had long sleeves and were usually made from heavyweight cotton. The most popular style was a crew neck (a rounded neckline) with laces. A rule requiring players to cover their knees was abolished, so for the first time in football history, knees were on show – and shorts reached to just above them. Knee-t! The dyes used for clothes at that time were not colour-fast, so football shirts would look more and more washed-out as the season went on.
Women’s football became popular during the First World War. Sometimes women wore the same kit as the men, but sometimes they wore very different kits that included full or calf-length skirts. They used bonnets in the team colours to keep their hair up.
1930S TO 1950S: BUTTONS UP
The first World Cup was played in 1930, by which time no one wanted a crew neck anymore. The most common shirt style in the UK had a collar and buttons down the front. Below the waist, shorts became baggy and there was a trend for hoops around the socks. Hoop hoop, hooray!
1950S: LIGHTWEIGHT
A few years after the end of the Second World War, which lasted between 1939 and 1945, English and Scottish clubs started to play against European clubs in tournaments such as the European Cup. Many of these European teams were better than the British clubs, and they wore a much more lightweight kit. As a result, the Brits copied their look. Out went the heavy collars and baggy shorts, and in came slick V-necks, short sleeves and shorter shorts. Heavy woollen socks became a thing of the past, and were replaced by lightweight nylon ones.
1960S: BRIGHT WHITE
The 1960s was a period of great cultural change and artistic creativity. New pop bands like The Beatles wore clothes that were neat and unfussy, and this was reflected in football. Shirts now had basic crew necks and long sleeves. The introduction of floodlights led to several clubs, most famously Leeds United, adopting all-white strips – white shirts, shorts and socks – which stood out particularly well.
1970S: FLARE FOR FASHION
If you look at photos of bands from the 1970s, you will see big haircuts, bold colours, glitter and flared trousers. Football fashion embraced this sense of excess. In England, shirts featured long droopy collars and decorative stripes down the side of the arms. And the hair! England’s best player Kevin Keegan became as famous for his “poodle” haircut as for his skills.
1980S: MATERIAL MANIA
New materials and manufacturing techniques radically changed the look and feel of football shirts. Artificial fabrics like polyester were much lighter to wear than the traditional cotton, and didn’t get heavy with sweat. It was also possible to produce very intricate designs like pinstripes and shadow stripes. The V-neck style was favoured. Players were allowed to choose whether to wear long or short sleeves, except at Arsenal where it was the captain’s decision.
1990S: OFF-PITCH STYLE
At the end of the twentieth century, it became fashionable for fans to buy replica shirts and wear them to matches. Then fans started to wear the replica kit all the time, at home and when out with friends. As a result, clubs started to design football shirts made to look good with jeans. This period was the most creative time for shirt designers. They introduced lots of new colours, such as powder blue and silver grey, and designed many inventive patterns, such as splotches, wavy stripes and even tiger stripes.
The first Women’s World Cup was held in 1991, and the women’s game became more popular throughout the decade. Women’s kit in general has the same style as the men’s.
2000 TO NOW: SKIN TIGHT
The crazy designs of the
previous decade settled down and the styles became much simpler again. What is seen as important now is less the pattern on the shirt but making sure the latest advances in fabric technology makes them as light and as water resistant as possible. Shorts became really long and baggy – at one point down to the knees, a length not seen for a hundred years – but are now rising again. Another innovation by some shirt manufacturers was to use super-skinny designs that look like they have been shrink-wrapped.
FOOTBALL SCHOOL’S WARDROBE OF WACKINESS
Welcome to our collection of curious and interesting shirts from around the world. Most teams prefer plain colours, stripes or hoops. But not all…
STRIPS WITH STRIPES
A shirt with vertical stripes makes you look thinner and taller. A shirt with horizontal stripes, known as hoops, makes you look shorter and wider. This optical illusion is one reason why vertical stripes are much more common than hoops in football, but hoops are much more common than vertical stripes in rugby. Footballers like to look tall, but rugby players want to look as bulky as possible.
FASHION QUIZ
1. Which part of the footballer’s body was exposed during matches for the first time at the beginning of the twentieth century?
a) The neck
b) The belly button
c) The bum
d) The knees
2. British kit-maker Humphreys Brothers later changed its name to which well-known sports brand?
a) Umbro
b) Adidas
c) Nike
d) Puma
3. Which of the following words means the same as “unfashionable”?
a) Groovy
b) Passé
c) Chic
d) Hot
4. Which European football club has sold the most replica shirts over the last decade?
a) Barcelona
b) Real Madrid
c) Bayern Munich
d) Manchester United
5. A football shirt is sometimes called a jersey, the name coming from the island of Jersey in the English Channel. Why?
a) The ancient inhabitants of Jersey were brilliant footballers.
b) Footballers used to wear protective leather tops made from the skin of Jersey cows.
c) Jersey’s sailors were famous for their woolly jumpers.
d) The people of Jersey were the first to stitch numbers onto the back of their clothes.
It only happens a few times every year and it’s one of the most memorable, most photographed and symbolic sights in football: the moment when the team captain lifts the trophy to celebrate a victory.
In this lesson, we’re going to ask why we use trophies to celebrate a win and also discover more about the materials they’re made from. We will meet the oldest trophy in football and try to solve three trophy mysteries that have baffled the world.
Hands up if you’re ready to lift the cup!
LEAFY DOES IT
Your team has won the final. The glory is yours. Surely that’s all you need?
Not quite. It is human nature to also want a prize that you can look at and touch. This prize will be a constant reminder to you – and your rivals! – of your triumph. In nearly all sports, the winner of a tournament receives an object, known as a trophy, which reminds them of their moment of glory long after the event. Trophies are traditionally objects such as a cup, statuette, medal and dish – or, in the case of Spanish bullfighting, one or two of the bull’s ears. Oh ear-ie me!
Trophies have been part of sporting events for thousands of years. In the ancient Olympic Games, the world’s earliest major sporting tournament held from around 800 BC, victorious athletes were crowned with a wreath of olive leaves cut from a sacred tree. Other Greek games gave crowns of celery leaves, pine leaves and bay leaves. (Bay is also known as laurel, which is where the phrase “to rest on one’s laurels” comes from, meaning to make no further effort because one has already achieved enough.)
Nowadays, trophies are usually made out of metal and, in the case of football, often shaped like a cup. Historians have long tried to get a handle (or two) on why a receptacle for drink became a symbol for sporting success, but the reason is not entirely clear. The first cups – wine goblets – began to appear as sporting trophies in the seventeenth century. By the time football became a popular sport two hundred years later, the idea of cups as trophies was an established part of sporting culture. Up the cups!
GOLD RUSH
The two most popular materials for trophies are gold and silver. These precious metals have long been associated with wealth. The reasons gold and silver are considered valuable are:
They are both quite rare. You could fit every piece of gold ever mined in the world into a square box with 20-metre sides.
They are lustrous. Most metals are grey or silvery grey, so gold and silver stand out and look pretty.
They are long-lasting. More common metals tend to tarnish. Copper goes green and iron goes red when exposed to air and water, but gold and silver stay shiny for longer.
SOFT TOUCH
Compared to other metals, gold and silver are both quite soft and malleable, meaning they easily bend. When gold or silver is used to make a trophy, the precious metal is usually mixed with other metals to make it harder and stronger. A material made from lots of metals is called an alloy.
The most common material used in making trophies is sterling silver, which is made of 92.5 per cent pure silver. The remaining 7.5 per cent is other metals, mainly copper. Sterling silver is tough, and harder to scratch or damage than pure silver.
To make a gold trophy, pure gold is mixed with metals such as silver, copper and zinc. Gold purity is measured using carats, a word that comes not from carrots but from the carob tree, whose seeds were used as weights when measuring out gold. Pure gold is 24 carats. The World Cup trophy is 18-carat gold, which means it is 75 per cent pure gold. That’s enough gold to make it glisten, but tough enough to withstand a trophy celebration!
Because gold is so soft, it can be hammered into paper-thin sheets. Sometimes trophies are made of a material called silver gilt, which is silver covered with a thin layer of gold.
TROPHY LOOKS LIKE MATERIAL
World Cup Two figures holding the globe 18-carat gold
Champions League Your aunt’s favourite vase with big handles Sterling silver
Women’s Champions League Vase with ribbon sash Sterling silver
Serie A Giant toothpaste tube with funnel on top Blue sodalite and silver gilt
Premier League Crown atop giant vase Sterling silver
Bundesliga Poshest fruit bowl ever Sterling silver
Ligue 1 Old vinyl record with a football in the middle Plexiglass, aluminium and resin
A DAY IN THE LIFE OF FOOTBALL’S OLDEST TROPHY
The oldest football trophy in existence is the Scottish Football Association Challenge Cup. It has been presented to the winners of the Scottish FA Cup since the 1873–4 season. With the help of the Scottish Football Museum’s curator, the cup spoke exclusively to Football School.
Mystery 1: The Rimet Riddle
Frenchman Jules Rimet planned the World Cup. He asked Abel Laffleur, a sculptor from Paris, to design a trophy for the first competition in 1930. Laffleur made a silver trophy of a cup being supported by Nike, the Greek goddess of victory, and coated it with gold. It was later renamed the Jules Rimet trophy.
Experts believe something happened to the Jules Rimet trophy between 1954 and 1958. The trophy Brazil won in Sweden in 1958 looked different to the one that West Germany won in 1954. The 1958 version appeared to be 5cm taller and had a different base.
MYSTERY: Was the 1958 trophy a copy? If so, where is the original?
STATUS:
Mystery 2: Stolen on a Sunday
In 1966, England hosted the World Cup. The Jules Rimet trophy was on display in a central London museum for a few months before the tournament began. One Sunday, when the guards were not looking, a thief or thieves broke in through the b
ack doors and stole the trophy. It was a huge embarrassment for English football and Scotland Yard was called in to solve the crime.
MYSTERY: Where was the trophy?
STATUS: A dog called Pickles found it seven days later, wrapped in newspaper under a bush in South London.
MYSTERY: Who was behind the theft?
STATUS:
Mystery 3: Burglary in Brazil
FIFA had a rule that the first country to win the World Cup three times would be allowed to keep the trophy. When Brazil won their third title in 1970, the Brazilians took the Jules Rimet trophy home. In 1983, it was stolen from the third floor of the Brazilian Football Confederation office in Rio de Janeiro. No one has seen it since. Brazil’s investigators said it had been melted down into gold bars, but this can’t be right, since the original trophy wasn’t made of gold!
MYSTERY: Where is the trophy?
STATUS:
After 1970, FIFA had a new trophy made. This time it was made of gold and featured two human figures holding up a globe. So far this trophy hasn’t gone missing. In fact, Ben once visited FIFA HQ in Zurich and is one of the few Englishmen to have lifted it!
Whoever gets to the bottom of either of the three unsolved mysteries above would be a true world champion, a soccer Sherlock Holmes.
