I was surprised at some of the criticisms I’ve read from Villa fans about the new 2009/10 home shirt. Two common themes seem to be, a) nothing special/innovative and, b) too similar to last year’s shirt.

In my opinion, Claret & Blue are best served simple, it’s very easy to create an absolute nightmare. Last season’s shirt was simple, classic even, so there was little to improve. Hence the similarity. A couple of common complaints last year were the continuation of the blue sleeves up to the neck and the neck itself being a ‘V’ instead of round. Both addressed this year, although the thin blue stripe on the shoulder will no doubt irritate the purists.

The point being that the club and Nike developed a very nice shirt last year that was largely well received. It was something in keeping with our heritage and fitting to our ambitions – Proud History | Bright Future anyone? Deviate too far away from that template and guess what, you’ve got something that looks like garbage. Can you say Muller?

It’s worth reviewing the recent history of Aston Villa home shirts as there’s been some real horror stories over the years. For 90 years there was very little deviation from the theme of claret torso and blue sleeves. In 1982 sponsorship was first introduced, which signified the start of mass consumerism, which led to things getting a bit fruity on the design front.

1981-1982	1982-1983	1983-1984	1984-1985	1985-1986
1986-1987	1987-1988	1988-1989	1989-1990	1990-1992
1992-1993	1993-1995	1995-1997	1997-1998	1998-1999
1999-2000	2000-2001	2001-2002	2002-2003	2003-2004
2004-2005	2005-2006	2006-2007
2007-2008	2008-2009	2009-2010

I separated the last three Nike years from the preceding 3 Hummel deliberately. Aside from the 06/07 “flappy” collar, all 6 shirts are essentially claret bodies with blue sleeves and either a round or ‘V’ neck. The main difference would be the “detailing” on the Hummel shirts, which is basically a repeating chevron design that was prevalent among their sports kits. They didn’t do anything original or innovative with our shirts, they just slapped on the same old thing that they did with the Denmark national team and practically anyone else who wore a Hummel shirt.

The two Diadora “Rover” shirts resemble the Nike shirts fairly well and before those, well they might have been very vogue at the time, but I struggle to find much appeal now. Taste is a personal thing, but the more the design is played with and made trendy, the less well it stands the test of time. The attraction will also be restricted to a smaller group, plain and simple might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but there’s little to be repulsed by. I think the Nike kits will stand the tests of time.

As a final note, if you feel minor changes don’t warrant a new shirt and you’re being “ripped off” (notwithstanding that purchasing a shirt is entirely your decision), you might want to check out the apparent policy surrounding our “3rd kit”. Clubs don’t generally need a third kit, but once European opposition becomes a factor the chances of the home and the away kits clashing increases. The top four all have third kits, sometimes referred to as “European kits”, which is unsurprising playing as they do in the highly original red or blue. Their massive shirt sale markets are surely coincidental?

Aston Villa haven’t been cynical enough to jump on this bandwagon just yet, although last season’s 3rd kit was worn only once that I recall: In Moscow, just enough to justify it’s existence. However, apart from the sponsor change, the 3rd kit was actually the very popular away kit from 2007/08. If 32Red has remained the sponsor then that shirt would genuinely have had two seasons of use.

Well, guess what. If you own last year’s away shirt then you’ve just got another season out of it:-

You can probably thank your uncle Randy for that.

Kit images copyright Historical Football Kits and reproduced by kind permission.