Avoiding the Drop

That team of course being Manchester United, as we announced Wednesday, however we won’t see Aon replace AIG till next season, so we’ll still see their lovely logo and I have a feeling no matter what it looks like, they won’t sell nearly as well in the US next year as in years past.

However we still haven’t seen their shirt for sure, so we can only speculate on what it may look like still. One shirt we did see this week is Everton, and um yeah, just join me after the jump for the awfulness.

Everton Home

Get happy Chelsea fans, your shirt no longer is the most bra like shirt in the EPL. I’m really not sure how you mess up a traditional blue shirt…well now I am, you do this to it. You can stitch all the goofy panels onto a shirt that you want to and it’ll still look decent on the pitch, but add a big white v to it and suddenly it looks horrible.

Burnley Home

Welcome to the EPL Burnley, this is how you make an entrance. I don’t even see a sponsor logo on the chest, though I’m sure there will be one. The one thing that usually sucks about teams that get promoted is that they bring with them their smaller shirt manufacturers who splash their logos all over the place and generally try and get a little too creative. But this one brings a certain bit of simple class to the first division. However this is now the 3rd team we have wearing burgundy shirts with baby blue sleeves. Also that crest doesn’t need to be THAT big does it? .

Blackburn Home

There isn’t much new here, Blackburn seems to be the most consistent of all the teams in terms of not veering off the path with their shirt style. They basically added some red and made the sponsor logo a little smaller. While I did like the lack of red on last seasons shirt, its not horrible here.

West Ham Away

I did cover this one 3 weeks ago, however if you may remember it was a partial picture and it had a different sponsor logo on it. Don’t get too excited though, they didn’t donate their sponsorship, this is just the kids shirt, they’ve still got a stupid betting sponsor. It is nice to see though, much like how Celtic took Carling off their kids shirts. Why not go the whole way though and donate the sponsorship to a charity?  As a neutral American I’m way more likely to purchase a West Ham shirt if something is going to charity. My favoritism towards Aston Villa rose when they revealed they were supporting acorns on their  shirts this past season, and I’ll probably buy a Villa shirt at some point mostly based on that reasoning. But instead West Ham got a few million pounds from a betting website, they do get some credit for this one though.

Wolverhampton Home and Away

Uhhh, welcome to the League Wolves, I was concerned I wouldn’t be able to see you, but nope, there you are. If you remember this past season, Wolves wore a color that more closely matched their badge. But now they’re going to come out in blindingly bright orange shirts with yet another gambling sponsor. Whats with the white and red away kit too? While I can’t find any history on their away kits its apparently a “nod to the past” but it doesn’t seem to make much sense and looks like a white tshirt under a tanktop. I’m really not seeing anything good here, sorry Wolves.

Tottenham Home (Rumored)

So this could well be the reason we saw the 3 colors for the Tottenham shirt last week in the teaser. I’m ok with the navy side panels, but the yellow seems off. This would be better suited for a Leeds shirt or something. Plus it looks pretty much like a template shirt, which are always real boring because there isn’t any personality in them. Also, don’t get too excited Spurs fans, there will surely be a sponsor but I’m guessing they’re still working that out.

Sunderland Away

So black or white seems to be the color of the season for away shirts in the EPL. Not a whole lot to say about these other than they’re certainly not garish, but they’re also not very interesting.

Italy Home

This is Italy’s special shirt for the Confederations Cup. While I’m certainly not a fan of the Italian national team, they don’t look too bad, provided they’re only going to be used for that tournament. Its a little wierd seeing Italy in something other than royal blue, just as it would be strange to see someone like Argentina come out in royal blue and white shirts. But again they’re not bad if they’re going to be used for a single short tournament.

Well that’s all for this week, see anything cool we missed? Let us know in the comments. In honor of the World Cup Qualifiers this weekend, I leave you with one of my favorite shirts of all time, Nigeria’s 1998 shirt, I always love the shirts for African countries, they’re usually pretty vibrant and kit makers seem more inclined to take risks with them.