Whether they are for yourself or bought as a gift, most football fans (and friends or family of football fans) will come across retro football shirts and kits as a potential present idea. They are quite a popular choice, especially for people who still think about a very specific event in the history of football that has stuck with them for years, but not all vintage football shirts are going to be equally attractive – or easy to get hold of.
Finding the Right Shirt
If you aren’t buying the retro football kit for yourself, then making sure you know what your gift-recipient wants is important. Not all football fans are bloodthirsty haters of the teams that oppose their beloved players, but that doesn’t mean that they will wear any old shirts you give them or atletico mineiro shirt, especially if it belongs to a team that they have no personal attachment to. For other fans, getting the historical football kits of their favourite team’s direct rival could even be a personal insult.
It isn’t hard to find out what they like, even if they don’t have any other possessions that make their team affiliation obvious – just ask them. In most cases, football fans are going to be fans of the larger teams that appear on television rather than smaller local ones, meaning that there will be plenty of merchandise on offer.
Other than that, you will also have to consider the usual issues when buying clothes: size, material preferences, and whether or not it could be easily cleaned. The last point is especially important if you know that the wearer might have the kit on while playing casual football themselves.
Why Choose a Retro Football Kit?
It might seem like an obvious choice to go for the most modern kit, but a lot of fans prefer the historical football kits of their favourite teams for being more recognisable. Major football teams are prone to changing their kit at least once a year – twice, technically, since the Home and Away kits are generally changed together – meaning that a new design could become outdated within a few months.
A lot of beloved historical kits are chosen because they are tied to a major event, like a Cup that the team managed to win or a landmark game that cemented their status as a major force in football. There are also simply some classic football shirts and shorts that stand out more than others, ones that people are instantly going to recognise as their favourite team even if they are over a decade old.
Finally, there is the fact that it stands out more. Unlike normal clothing styles, where “out of fashion” is a real problem that can make certain outfits much less desirable to wear, football gear is almost always appealing. An older design doesn’t look tacky or out-of-place, but can actually seem more valuable, especially if the kit comes from something like a World Cup or major football championship game.
Finding a Retro Football Kit
If you want replica old football shirts, they aren’t hard to find at all – in fact, they are spread all over the internet and often appear alongside sports gear or men’s clothing sections of normal clothes shops. However, for a lot of people, it is tempting to go for something more authentic and less mass-produced. If that is the case, then you will want to find a classic football kit.
There are a lot of ways you can go about this, but the easiest is to make use of sites that exist to trade these shirts around. Whether they are buying them from people directly or using an existing stock of old shirts, there are sites that deal with vintage football kit buying and selling on a reasonably large scale. Not only are these going to be quite reputable, but they have a lot of options to choose from, which can help you avoid having to look for less-trusted sources.
While it might cost less to buy a cheap replica shirt from another online store, you have to remember that quality is always a concern. For some people, there is nothing worse than being given a cheap knockoff of what they originally wanted, and you never know if the materials are going to be weaker or if the design as a whole is flawed.
