The excitement was great. The German company Puma released their new jerseys these days. Almost all of the clubs they equipped had to come to terms with a uniform look. Bar goods that you would expect from Primark and that have to do without the club crest. This led to greater confusion this week in the Europa League qualifier between the Mesut Özil club Fenerbahçe and Helsinki. The goal scorer, Muhammed Gümüskaya, was desperately looking for the coat of arms while celebrating the goal. He wanted to kiss it, like so many before him.
After all, it was his first ever goal in an international game. But there was no coat of arms. Amusement on the Internet. But also excitement on the street, where the Borussia Dortmund fans had already fought against this jersey. The Bundesliga club’s third jersey is still pending. Bayern Munich also surprised this week with the so-called mountain jersey. And in Amsterdam, Ajax remembers Bob Marley. The Italian first division team Venice relies on elegance.
Time to talk to Stefan Appenowitzwhose book “Bundesliga jerseys 1963 to today” is one of the standard works in jersey research. It has long been sold out and is difficult to find even on the used market. A new edition with a slightly different concept is being considered and planned. His new book will appear in October “The Gladbach jersey from 1900 to today” in the workshop publishing house. He has it along with that Shirt collector Matthias Gorke and the “Tagesspiegel” sports editor Stefan Hermanns.
ntv.de: Mr. Appenowitz, you are one of the leading German jersey researchers. Can you tell us what the Puma franchise third kits are all about?
Appenowitz: Puma is basically going the way that many suppliers have always followed. Certain jersey designs or templates, i.e. templates to be used for several clubs, which are then individually matched to the respective colors of the clubs, but otherwise look the same. Do you remember, for example, the floodlit jersey from last season by VfL Bochum with the special wide collar? This template was also used at other Nike clubs: 1860 Munich, FC Augsburg and so on. So what’s happening there for now is nothing new. It already existed in the 1980s. One thinks, for example, of the pinstripe jerseys from Adidas, which were worn in a similar shape but with different colors by Bochum, HSV, Hanover, Bielefeld, Dortmund.
Puma goes one step further this year. This has already started with the European Football Championship. These new templates were already being used by the Puma teams in Italy, Austria, Slovakia and Switzerland. The black third jersey from Austria, for example, did not have the national coat of arms on the jerseys, while Italy, Switzerland or Slovakia had the coat of arms on it.
With a club jersey something like that triggers even more emotions in the fans than with a national team jersey. At BVB, for example, the fans rebelled so much against it that the club emblem is now on these third jerseys. However, the club crests are missing from the other Puma clubs shown there. I cannot say why Puma decided to design such jerseys. In addition to the missing coat of arms, there is also this strange collar, which also makes these jerseys look a bit cheap. But of course Puma has achieved one thing: Everyone is talking and writing about it.
Fenerbahçe pro Muhammed Gümüskaya was one of the first to score in this shirt. He looked in vain for the coat of arms. He wanted to kiss it. Since when have footballers been able to kiss the coat of arms?
It varies and also depends on the clubs. In the 1980s, players could often only have kissed the sponsor’s imprint. There was no club crest on the jerseys. There are also photos and jerseys from the beginning of the Bundesliga, when the jerseys were completely blank. And in 1976/77 BVB even sold all of its coat of arms for the tobacco brand Samson. Just like the pioneer in jersey advertising, Eintracht Braunschweig, where the Braunschweig lion became the Jägermeister brand deer.
What’s up with the third kits? It wasn’t always there. Are these produced solely for marketing purposes?
No, these third kits have a practical background. There are many clubs with the same club colors. And if they were to compete in their actual third jerseys, then there would be no differentiation. That’s why every team has third jerseys that allow this playability against each other. Most of the time, the clubs or suppliers choose colors that have nothing to do with the actual colors of the club. But that is not a requirement. Some clubs like Eintracht Frankfurt or FC Augsburg always try to use all three club colors and that’s where it fits. But for clubs with blue-white or red-white as the main color, it will be more difficult. Then you usually go to a completely different color with the third party.
Have they always been primarily unimaginative?
Since such a third jersey is rarely used in the Bundesliga, it is not worthwhile for clubs and suppliers to design their own jersey model for it. Therefore, of course, such templates are used there. But that too differs from club to club. The big clubs that have high-value kit contracts are sure to get a third jersey that is not off the rack.
Bayern’s mountain jersey is not unimaginative. Will it be just an anecdote or will we remember it in ten years?
The mountain jersey is the jersey for the Champions League and is also called that. But of course it can also be used as a third jersey in the Bundesliga. The idea, the look and the implementation of this mountain jersey is so special that you will definitely remember it in ten years. And if Bayern are successful at that, anyway.
Juventus also has unusual colors and a remarkable design. It’s going back to the 1990s. Borussia Dortmund also drew attention to itself last season with a jersey with recourse to this epoch of the game. Bochum’s legendary Faber jersey is a cult classic. Will the 1990s also be glorified among jersey designers?
Last week I spoke to an English Dortmund fan for a report in an English fanzine and I see it very often that the 90s is one of the most popular epochs among collectors and fans. English collectors in particular love the Bundesliga jerseys from the 90s. I feel the same way in some areas. My fascination comes not only from the sudden splendor of colors on the jerseys, but from the multitude of new outfitters who cavorted in the Bundesliga from the beginning of the 90s. In the eighties it was only Adidas and Puma, in the seventies the forerunners Erima and Palme and occasionally also Umbro or Hummel.
Nike then completely opened up and redefined the entire market in 1990 with BVB and the bright neon jerseys. Italian suppliers such as Lotto, Diadora and Fila came into the Bundesliga. The Americans from Reebok got in big or a real running sports specialist like Asics tried his hand at football. There was a spirit of optimism and it probably pulled the jersey designers along too.
The colors of the iconic Bochum jersey were the colors of the sponsor Faber Lotto, who was also the supplier to VfL Bochum during that season. With all the courage that the new outfitters brought into the market at the time, I dare to doubt that there would have been a jersey like this with Reebok, for example, which had outfitted VfL before Faber.
Is it correct to say that the 2021/2022 season will feature particularly ugly jerseys?
As always, it’s all a matter of taste. As a Gladbach fan, I can say, for example, that I don’t like our home kit this season as much as it did last season, when both the home and away kits were particularly plain. I just like it that way. However, the new home kit combines three eras in one kit. I would have liked to have focused, for example, only on the eighties, if one was already orienting oneself to the past. But maybe we older fans are no longer the target group.
There are also particularly beautiful specimens. Ajax Amsterdam introduces a reggae jersey, the Serie A club Venice shines with a remarkable jersey. What does a third jersey have to bring with you?
As mentioned earlier, the colors of the third jerseys are not always that easy. Borussia Mönchengladbach has of course already chosen black, a color that is very popular with the fans. Even if the rest of the jersey is too crowded and the coat of arms is missing. In principle, I can have a black jersey every season.
Away from the third jerseys. Which first division jersey are you convinced of this season?
Arminia Bielefeld has had really good jerseys for me for several years. Both with the current outfitter Macron as well as with Joma before. I also really like the VfB Stuttgart home shirt this season. When it comes to away jerseys, I really like the black jersey from Spielvereinigung Greuther Fürth, although I find horizontal stripes rather suboptimal.
For Appenowitz one of the most beautiful jerseys of all time: the Kickers 1991/1992.
(Photo: imago / Sportfoto Rudel)
And which one is not?
Unfortunately, I can’t make friends with the VfL Bochum jersey this year. Last year the VfL floodlight jersey was the best Nike jersey for me in years, but I can’t get used to the one from this season.
What do you think is the most beautiful Bundesliga jersey of all time?
In addition to many beautiful Gladbach jerseys, the jersey of the Stuttgarter Kickers from the 1991/92 season will always be something special for me. With this jersey from the actual ski brand Erbacher in combination with the large coat of arms on the jersey and trousers, my fascination for jerseys and for suppliers and sponsors began. Without even knowing it at the time that 30 years later I would write books about it.
Mr. Appenowitz, thank you very much for this interview.
Stephan Uersfeld conducted the interview
.