Mid-Week Fixture: "I'm having a party... it's gonna be very... colorful"

While watching Liverpool-Chelsea recently, a friend of mine questioned, with almost sheer shock, the lack of soccer teams wearing white, particularly while playing at home. This wasn't the first time he had brought it up, but there was little I could say in response other than "Umm, because neither team is known for wearing white" and "because it looks cooler this way." Ironically, he's a Padres fan, so who is he to question why soccer teams never wear white?!



While there are a few notable exceptions, white doesn’t play too prominent of a role on the club level with regard to primary uniforms. A few teams have occasionally used white as their alternate (ie Road) jersey, generally used only when there would be a clash. Mostly these jerseys are designed simply to sell more of them, as they usually only last a year and provide a unique souvenir for that particular season. Even Arsenal wore yellow in the 2006 Champions League final, a color jersey they'd worn as their alternate kit for years.

Internationally, really only England and Germany’s primary jersey colors are white. (Of course, there are more examples, but these are the ones that spring to mind of important, trend-setting teams – closer to home, one could argue that, by recently changing their gear to coincide with David Beckham’s arrival, the L.A. Galaxy have opted for a clean look that resembles Real Madrid, home and away) Most countries have stuck to an established color scheme that reflects their obvious color scheme, although that's not always set in stone, a point I will get to later.

I’m not sure exactly why teams have, in general, stayed away from white. I can only surmise that white materials were more common a century ago, so teams began to distinguish themselves by using new (and now traditional) colors. As a former equipment manager myself, I can appreciate the fact that white is also more difficult to wash, making colors a more attractive and logical option. Furthermore, we live in a colored world, rendering extreme cases of contrast (dark and white) pointless, hence we can watch a game with one team wearing all blue and the other all red. In some cases, white is a painful reminder of the past. Brazil lost the 1950 World Cup final at home to Uruguay, the most painful and unexpected loss in that country's rich soccer history. Four years later, the team ditched white in favor of yellow, won the next World Cup four years later and haven't looked back since.

It’s long been established that Italy and the Netherlands wear blue and orange, respectively, as tributes to the monarchy and founding fathers, to little objection. Both normally wore white shorts with the look, and for a period, Holland wore black, but both seem to be going for the monochromatic look a lot lately. Not only are there looks cool, it’s provided a unique identity and comical looks amongst the fans. When I think of the Italian flag, azzuri springs to mind before I have to correct myself that it's red, white and green; it's the same with the Dutchies. It's safe to say soccer's worldwide popularity has helped create a distinguishable identity for countries that wouldn't exist without the game. They couldn't have done it in white.

The U.S. will trot out at next month’s Women’s World Cup wearing gold, which was argued by Nike as being "the color of premium, the color of victory. The U.S. women have won two World Cups. They've won two Olympic gold medals. If any team on the planet deserves to wear this color, it's them.” Surely, this isn't based presumptuously on the fact that our girls are the best in the world - they aren't even the defending champ, and are no locks this time, either - yet it also doesn't mesh well with Nike's slogan for the team this go-around, "The Best Team You've Never Heard Of." Then why wear gold? Few players remain from the days when they achieved cult status eight years ago, so why establish this golden legacy? It'd be like the Bulls issuing commemorative gold jerseys years after Jordan and Pippen left. Perhaps, as San Diego Union-Tribune writer Mark Ziegler wrote, the US should try to establish a standard uniform across the board to adopt a consistent look. God forbid the United States establishes a soccer tradition. Or, while we're looking to grab people's attention, and color is apparently not an issue, may I suggest something like this instead. FIFA president Sepp Blatter has ideas he'd rather see.


Of course, uniform tinkering is evident worldwide, namely when my favorite four-letter word, FIFA, is involved. World Cup rules state, briefly, that all items on the two teams’ uniforms must have clear contrast, leading to odd-ball uniform matchups like this take place when color like this is so much better.

FIFA most notably screws up Brazil’s classic look at least once a World Cup - ugh - choosing complete contrast over tradition and aesthetics. In some cases, intended uniform combinations are often rendered meaningless, as I can personally attest: when the US faced Paraguay in the Under-20 World Cup opener in Abu Dhabi in 2003, we had to wear white socks with the navy jerseys and white shorts, a combination I had successfully avoided in two years because that combo was never intended to ever happen, and it was cheap-looking. An aside, I also forgot to pack black goalkeeper socks for that trip, and didn’t notice until gameday. I was stuck with this goalkeeping combo, with red socks, for that first game – my uniform nightmare game, apparently. We won the game 3-1. Finding a pair of black Nike soccer socks in Abu Dhabi proved easier than convincing the goalkeeper, Steve Cronin (now of the Galaxy), to change the luck, so he wore the same combo for the next game, a 3-1 loss to Germany (a game in which we were back to normal). Most of the oddball things you might read here can mostly be chalked up to human error and superstition, just like this one.

Of course, some teams just don't have the white uniform option. Barcelona has had its fair share of weird uniform colors (including the aforementioned orange ones), but have not and will never wear white - it's Real Madrid's color. Perhaps Barca could extend that policy to its players' feet, as seemingly everybody wears white boots for them. And others, such as anytime Liverpool and Manchester United play, somebody can't wear red.

Sadly, I still don't have a better answer than "it looks cooler" to give to my friend, but dammit, it just looks cooler! I suppose I can file yet another question like this under the expanding "who knows, it just is" category in soccer discussions, but at least I can give a professional opinion on this argument, rather than just saying "I like this better." Why be stuck wearing white, the least distinguishable, most universal and most bland uniform color, when the options just look better?

Wouldn't we all want to see more of this anyway?