Thanks for joining us for the second part of our presentation of the 2017-18 Premier League kits. Let’s not beat around the bush.
WEST HAM
The Hammers had a dull time at their new stadium last year, but managed to come in 11th, which isn’t that bad. The bottom half of the table last year was pretty rubbish overall, it has to be said.West Ham, aka the Armie Hammers, aka the Jeremy Irons, are still with Umbro who are creating some simple kits, including a black away shirt. The home kit has a two-tone claret design that looks like the chevron shape of one of their kits from around 1978 I think it was? Their sponsor ‘Betway’ sounds like it should be in a list with ‘Between’ and ‘Betwixt’. Where will they come this season? Stay up, probably, but not better than 11th. They will have a third kit, which I believe is white with an ancient style West Ham badge.
LEICESTER CITY
I remember when Leicester won the league. Seems impossible now in the age of multi-billion pound transfers and Pep Guardiola level coaches, but there was a time when teams like Leicester could do the impossible. Innocent times they were. Yes before you say “hang it was only last year”, just think about how different the world was back then in May 2016. Yeah? Now you see what I mean. Leicester managed to stay up after sacking their title-winning manager Ranieri, stopping their slide from Champions League to Championship, and got a respectable 12th place in the end. I think they will be a lot better this year, not champions but challenging for the European places. As long as they can find the net. The kit is ok, sticking with the gold trim again, and staying all blue (I’d like to see white shorts back, personally). Puma have given them decent clean kits again; Leicester never go in for snazzy nonsense.
STOKE CITY
Probably time for Stoke to get relegated, I think. I just don’t see them staying up. The home kit is ok I suppose, the away kit has League One written all over it. The third kit is really imaginative. At least they are made by Macron, also the leader of Free France. Stoke are probably still too good to get relegated but I just have a feeling they will be down there. Mark Hughes might get sacked, I dunno.
CRYSTAL PALACE
It’s be great if at the centre of Selhurst Park they actually had a Dark Crystal floating above a shaft of air and fire. I like that Palace are in the Premier League and I hope they stay, I want as many London clubs up there as possible (well maybe not QPR). But the thing about Palace being in the PRemier League is that it’s a bit like being really excited about connecting with an old friend from the 90s again, hallo mate how you goin’ mate, wow you aint changed mate, good to see you mate, then friending them on Facebook, and then just being bored by all of their boring posts about work, that’s kind of who Crystal Palace are. If they were a Game of Thrones house they would be House Mallister. Their kit is still made by Macron, who make pretty good kits, but the new sponsor is a bit of a mess. “ManBetx”??
SWANSEA CITY
Gylfi is going to leave Swansea again isn’t he. I love Gylfi Sigurdsson. He looks a bit like a younger Kevin Bacon, but with more Icelandic awesomeness. I though Swansea were going to drop like a dead duck last season (hang on, dead ducks float, right?) and they even had an American manager very briefly, Lord Voldemort’s stunt-double Bob Bradley and he didn’t last very long, but in the end they steadied the ship and stayed afloat. Will they go down this year? Maybe. I hope not, as I want to keep a bit of Welsh in the Premier League. Their away kit is quite Welsh, being in the classic red and green worn by the national team, while the third kit is in the also very patriotically Welsh colours of black and yellow, the colours of the flag of St. David. The home kit is classic Swansea white with black trim, made by Joma, who also make the Sampdoria shirt I own (so I can assure you they are quite good quality).
BURNLEY
Burnley stayed in the Premier League, I am glad because I quite like them, but I wish their shorts were white this season. They are using a Puma template for the home kit, while the away kit has little horizontal pinstripes running along it that actually consists of the word ‘CLARETS’ over and over again. Which is an anagram of ‘SCARLET’. Frankly, I don’t give a damn. Burnley, like Swansea, also have one of those great Icelandic players we fell for last summer, Jóhann Berg Guðmundsson, who doesn’t look much like Kevin Bacon. Burnley will probably get a third kit, they all do.
WATFORD
Are we nearly there yet? I should have had a gap here around Watford. I like Watford, they are a kind of nearby club to where I am from (it’s actually about as far as Tottenham is but it’s outside London; the 142 bus goes straight there from Burnt Oak but it takes forever. You don”t care, sorry). There were quite a few Watford fans at my school as a kid (and one of my good friends in England, James, is a big Watford fan), I just remember them all singing about how much they hated Luton, oh they really hate Luton. I can’t say I’m a fan of the airport much. One of the greatest names ever associated with Watford (aside from the famous former owner who worked alongside him to make Watford great in the 80s, Elton John, yes my American friends, that Elton John, big lover of Watford) was Graham Taylor. He died in January and I must say I am very sad, I would have loved to have met him. Sure I fell into the whole ‘calling him a turnip’ category back in the day, when I listened to all the tabloids when he was England manager (only because he subbed off my beloved Gary Lineker) but listening to him talk about the game over the years, he was a proper geezer and right gentleman. However he made Watford play in red shorts (which I like) but Watford fans generally prefer them to play in black shorts. This year they are in adidas, and have an all red away kit, using a template similar to Middlesbrough last year, which looks like a car with some paint on its wheel has driven over it. By the way, did you know Watford is twinned with Whoville? Also with Wensleydale, Ware, Hounslow, Ypres, Wearside and Wichita.
NEWCASTLE UNITED
They had to come back up didn’t they! Led by the great Benitez, the Toon Army (not affiliated with Cartoon Network or Nicktoons) (or iToons), the Magpies and their black and white stripes are back in the big time. This time next year they will probably be back down in the little time again (no, I don’t think so this time, but lads, it’s Newcastle, they will find a way). I have a good mate Simon who is a long-suffering Newcastle fan. I would love it if they did a Man City and got a super rich owner, just love it. Their away kits are boring this year, has to be said. Not kidding anyone with that sponsir either, ‘Fun88’ but it’s better than their old ‘Wonga’ one. Prediction – top half of the table, knock knock knocking on Everton’s door. If they were a Westerosi house, definitely the Starks. Or maybe the Karstarks.
BRIGHTON AND HOVE ALBION
Yes folks you read that right – BRIGHTON AND HOVE ALBION are in the Premier League! They deserved it too, and their boss is one of my favourite former Spurs players, Chris Hughton. Now I am old enough to remember Brighton, aka The Seagulls, in the top flight back in the 80s, with that big guy Steve Foster who wore the headband, he was a proper Roy of the Rovers style legend (probably because I remember reading about his life story in Roy when I was a kid, remember they used to do that? I never thought I would see Brighton up in among the big boys again but here they are, rubbing shoulders with the likes of Burnley, Watford, Bournemouth, Stoke, Huddersfield, Swansea, and Man City. Their kit is a simple Nike template with the Brighton stripes. I remember when they had stripey shorts too, a long time ago. I think Brighton will stay up, but only just. I stayed up once in Brighton, New Years Eve, all night, went to like seven parties with this group of people, interesting night but I got lost coming back to the place I was kipping over and ended up walking round and round for ages this place called Seven Dials, a roundabout that had seven streets coming off of it. I knew it was one of those streets, but which one, I had no clue. It was very much daylight and 2001 by the time I finally found it. I remember one of the guys living at this house was a Dr Who fan, or a “Brighton Whovian” as a said, instantly thinking that’s a terrible pun as I said it. Like that has ever stopped me saying terrible puns. So anyway, do watch the Seagulls this season, they will really Brighton your day…
HUDDERSFIELD TOWN
I am so thrilled that Huddersfield are finally in the Premier League. I can’t believe it, it doesn’t sound true. That makes three teams with blue and white stripes in the top flight of English football since I don’t even know when (and one of them isn’t even Sheffield Wednesday). Huddersfield, aka The Terriers, are wearing a really interesting design for their maiden Premier League appearance, the stripes appear to be made of tiny circles. The spots of red really go well with the light blue and white, and they also have one of those sponsors with a lot of Chinese writing beneath it. I have to say I enjoy recreating those in MS Paint, not super acuurately but as best as I can do. The away kit, is, yeah but the third kit is oh my good look at that! My MS Paint skills do it no justice but it is based on an away kit they wore back in the 90s, I think, I do remember it. There were some crazy kits back then, craaaazy kits (I fully approve of 90s crazy kits). Huddersfield were great back in the day, that is almost a century ago, winning three league titles in a row back in the 1920s, yes, Huddersfield have more league title trophies than Spurs. Dammit.
And that is it, these are the new kits of the English Premier League season. I predict Man U will win it, though I’m not confident of that, and the following will go down: Stoke, Huddersfield (sorry Terriers), and Swansea. Though I am famously terrible at predictions. Now, I will be posting more kits soon, some of the different ones from around Europe, but in the meantime sit back and enjoy the footy, the urban sketches are coming back next post…
Let’s be honest. Spurs should have been in this spot. In many other seasons what Tottenham did would have been good enough to win the Premier League…but in 16-17, Chelsea were just even better. In fact in all Premier League history (since 92-93) their points total of 93 was the second-best (second only to Chelsea of 2004-05). It helped that they didn’t have a European campaign to distract them, but they also had a new coach, Antonio Conte, and he is pretty awesome. How will his difficult second season be? I don’t know, but they will probably be in the top three. Blah blah blah. They have ditched Adidas though, and now have a simple new kit made by Nike, who use the same template as pretty much every other team they make kits for this season (which is handy for someone making a lot of Nike kits in MS Paint, by the way). The away kit is just a direct reverse of the first. They will have a third kit for sure, as will most of the Nike teams, but since they aren’t released yet I’m not drawing the template (bit hard).
My beloved, beloved Spurs left White Hart Lane in May for the last time, and will play all of 2017-18 at Wembley Stadium while the new Tottenham stadium is built on the site of the old Lane. Rainbows and sing-songs and a record points total and the most goals in the Premier League. Now the Lane is rubble, and Spurs have ditched Under Armour for a Nike template. Very very similar to the one Chelsea got. I really like the away shirt, and I like that Nike have just said, you know what, just wear the same navy shorts home and away (unlike last year’s very slightly different navy home and away shorts). In fact I ordered the away kit from the Spurs shop in the UK, best part of a month later, still not here. We will get a third kit, which is a kind of dark purple/black colour that reminds me of a chewy sweet. How will our season go? Kane, loads of goals again please, Erikson, totally amazing. We lost Walker and will probably lose Rose, full-backs who want a ton more cash. Don’t they know we have a stadium to build? Our team is nevertheless growing up strong, and Pocchettino has proven himself to be a remarkable coach. I don’t think we will win the league this year, unfortunately. Then again, I said that last year. (Oh yeah, I suppose I was right…but we were bloody good!) If we do, and I promise you this right now, if Spurs win the League I will put on ALL of my Tottenham shirts, every single one, and run around the streets of north Davis shouting COME ON YOU SPURS!
It’s great having untold pots of cash. You can say, oh you want to earn double what you earn, come here then. But good luck selling players you have on those massive wages when they fall out of favour (looking at Samir Nasri, still on City’s books). Pep had a tepid first season, and has spent big this summer so he can have a Pep-tastic second season. It’s what he is best at, being at a club where you can just spend loads rather than actually be any good. They can buy millions of pounds worth of players and win a few games and everyone will call Pep a genius. They will start like lightning , but I don’t see them doing much. Halfway through the next season, if City start to slump again, he will get glum and start saying he doesn’t like football any more. I don’t mind City though, I always liked their fans who were loyal when City were utterly terrible (just a reminder, just over ten years ago their manager was Stuart Pearce; I’d like to see Pep try to manage that team) and definitely don’t begrudge them their riches, after all those years in Fergie’s Shadow (TM). I like this season’s kit, another unimaginative Nike template, and white shorts is always better for City, but I am especially fond of the colour of the away kit, they’ve had a few nice ones in similar colours.
Liverpool’s kits are made by New Balance and the home kit is a pretty sweet one, a throwback to the 80s, the good ol’ days when Liver-poool were grreat. Like, proper grreat. Ian Rush, Kenny Dalglish, Mark Lawrenson. Modern Liverpool haven’t won a title in the Premier League era (in fact, not a single title since Maggie Thatcher left office). They won’t win it this season either, but they have a fun coach in Herr Klopp. So the second kit is interesting, a throwback to a famous green and white quartered kit from the mid-90s, the MacManaman / Redknapp / Collymore / Fowler era. I loved that kit, one of the best they ever had in my opinion. This one is nice but the green bits are pinstripes. The collar is boring. The third kit is orange. Or amber? Either way it should be in the middle so they can look like traffic lights. Eh eh eh.
If you believe the newspapers, Arsenal have apparently stopped winning things under their manager Arsene Wenger (who has been in charge of the Gunners since the Herbert Chapman era). Oh, except for the FA Cup three out of the past four seasons. What is this devilry, do I defend Arsenal? No, not going to happen (those scars run too deep), but I am glad they have stuck with Arsene, and he has doggedly refused to move on. Since he has been at Arsenal, Mourinho has managed seven different clubs, one of them twice. Arsene has been at Arsenal so long, he was there when they were in Woolwich. When he arrived they were still called Dial Square and in fact the club is named after him. He is becoming the Guy Roux of French football managers. He was the Ronaldo to Fergie’s Messi. So now Arsenal find themselves away from the Champions League for the first time since it became the Champions League with an opportunity to fall out of the Europa League early and ‘do a Chelsea’. I have a feeling they just might do it you know, send ol’Arsey off with a final Premier League trophy before he retires on a high to a nice villa near Monaco and oh who are we kidding hey won’t win it and he will stay there forever… Oh the kits, yeah they are ok, Puma, second kit is nice, not too sure about the third kit though. Home socks are decent.
Ok I hate saying this and I really hope they don’t, but United will win the league this year. I was hoping they would have a Liverpool sized post-Fergie title drought (or Tottenham-sized, even better) but it’s that Mourinho second season (is he still living out of the hotel?), they have spent biiiig (again, spend loads and they will call you a genius, Jose, if you win; try doing it at another club such as, I dunno, Leicester). Jose has more signings to make (stay away from Spurs! No seriously Daniel Levy hates you) and has offloaded aging stars Zlatan (whose book is no longer above mine in the amazon rankings, hooray!) and that fellow Rooney, who went back to boyhood club Everton (he looks younger already!). No I sense something is in the air, I think this is the year Jose will win his United title, and if you thought Trump’s gloats about his f***ing electoral college win were annoying enough, just wait for Jose Mourinho, the Gloaty One. The United kits this year, the home kit is pretty sweeet, I like the simple button-up collar and the short adidas stripes on the shoulder. The second kit is like a black version of their 1991-92 blue and white away kit, the one covered in what look like maple leaves which they won the Rumbelow’s Cup in (am I remembering that right? Normally I do my homework on this stuff but I can’t be bothered looking up who sponsored England’s third-tier trophy 25 years ago) (I’m all about remembering the Premier League 25 years ago though, huh) (now that is the proper definition of an elitist). Anyway United apparently liked that design so brought it back a quarter of a century later. The third kit is grey and has a picture of old United players on it, a statue from outside Old Trafford. I remember that other grey kit they had in the 90s, the one they had to change at half-time vs Southampton. Stop me if I’m boring you.
Everton got Rooney back, and they have a nice new Umbro kit. It is blue. Some bits are darker blue. I like the shorts. They are white. The socks are also white. Ok enough of this Jack and Jill talk. The greying away kit, a reference no doubt to the age of Everton’s tenure in the top flight, actually features a bizarre maze-like pattern running over the whole shirt which was designed to annoy me while trying to recreate it in pixels in MS Paint, like by line. Everton will probably have a third kit which will be in dark blue and purple with fluorescent yellow trim, but they hadn’t released it when I drew this. Everton are going to finish in 7th place this year. They are like the Wall at the North of Westeros, acting as a huge barrier to the between the Wildlings and the Top Six. Occasionally one Wildling will break through, as Leicester did, but in the end they all bend the knee.
If Southampton were a kingdom in Game of Thrones, they would be the Dornish. For literally no other reason than they are in the South. I tell you what though, I really like their new kits, made by Under Armour. The home kit is reminiscent of a famous Southampton kit from the 1980s (teams like doing that don’t they), which I have distant childhood memories of (I vaguely recall Kevin Keegan, big perms, and the words Rank Xerox). The away kit, and this is genius (Pep-level maybe?), but it’s what you would get if you took a Southampton shirt and inverted the colours. Mind. Blown. Southampton have Ronald Koeman as their manager (what? He’s at Everton now? Who replaced him? Claude Puel?) sorry, I mean, Frenchman Claude Puel is Southampton’s manager (sorry what? they sacked him? Who is in charge now? ‘Mauricio Pellegrino’? Really?) Southampton are now coached by their former coach and current Spurs boss Mauricio Pocchettino (what? oh right sorry, mis-heard) former Man City boss Manuel Pellegrini, who (eh? sorry what is it now? Not him either? Well who is this guy then? Are you sure that’s right?) Ok, Southampton, who have a new manager, will be looking to break past the Evertonian wall and into the top six or seven or whatever.
Hang on, sorry this must be wrong. It says here Bournemouth came ninth in the Premier League last season. Is that right, does that sound right? Apparently it is true! Wow, what times we live in. They have signed my dude Jermain Defoe, who I hope will keep scoring goals. Bournemouth is a popular south coast summer holiday destination and definitely isn’t known for being a favourite retirement destination for senior citizens who want to live beside the seaside (to quote myself from last season); Jermain definitely isn’t retiring. He spent a little while on loan at the Cherries a million years ago (scoring a bucket load, as he does). Bournemouth have replaced JD Sports with Umbro this year, and it’s a decent enough design, very plain. I think I preferred last season’s actually. Where will they finish this year? Jermain will keep them up! He couldn’t keep up Sunderland last year but he gave it a good go, bless him. I want the south coast teams to all be in the Premier League. We have Southampton, Bournemouth (I still don’t believe it), now Brighton have been promoted too, let’s get Portsmouth back, then we need to work on Exeter and Plymouth, oh and don’t forget Torquay United.
Okay last one in this segment, West Bromwich Albion, who came a dramatic tenth last season. I remember when Spurs used to come tenth and I’d be like, well, it’s the top half of the table, that’s something. West Bro have gone from mostly white with stripes to mostly blue with stripes. The back of the West Bra shirt is all blue. This is in my opinion just typical of 2017. The West Bruh away kit is an odd choice and I’m sure they will need a third kit. The new sponsor was fun to draw in MS Paint. My prediction for West Bruv is that they will come in mid-table, like between 9th and 13th, which should filled all Baggies fans with boundless optimism. Hey West Bro have the highest stadium in England at the Hawthorns so if this is still like Game of Thrones they are like the Knights of the Vale. Also the WBA Heavyweight boxing belt is named after them, so there’s a little known alternative factoid.
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