French Ligue 1 kit reviews - 2008-09 season

Hola Amigos. It’s Chris. The guy that writes about soccer uniforms for Albion Road. The only person that has been complaining about my lack of articles is Headmaster Jeremy, and that’s probably because we all know that websites start to look stale if they don’t refresh their content regularly… so in that case I can’t blame him, we all should strive for better aesthetics!

Anyway, I have chatted about some of the big leagues and their uniforms. I also mentioned the MLS—which is as scrappy as they come. In my mind the next two ‘big’ football leagues to cover would be Italy and Germany… but screw that. Those guys get plenty of press. I can sum up Italy’s Serie A uniforms by saying: I don’t like the black stripes of AC Milan, Inter Milan, and Juventus all that much. But I might cover all that later. Germany has some interesting uniforms too, but maybe some other season.

Instead, I will take on the French Ligue 1. Why? Well, I have a soft spot for France, their history, people, food, language, and films. To adapt the classic French tone one has to be a bit of a contrarian, and I am one of those. There is plenty not to like as well, so I don’t want anybody to get the wrong idea… but I do like France and like to travel there when I can. It helps that I have a few friends there, and I’ll get to that shortly.

Ligue 1 French football is a bit odd. It has served as the launching pad for some of the world’s best players. Of the modern era, I’d put Zinedine Zidane at the top of that list. Before he played for Juventus and Real Madrid he played in Cannes and Bordeaux. Like all the “smaller” leagues across the world, young starlets when they gain more notoriety and accolades, they will be scooped up by the bigger clubs around Europe. There are a number of current players that came up this way, Thierry Henry for example. This is all to say that there is some pretty good talent coming out of France, and with their colonial ties to Africa, France tends to be the first stop for many well-respected players of African birth (which, if good enough, France will nationalize to play on their national team). Despite producing a number of great players, the French clubs never get very far in European competitions. The most noteworthy example of that is Olympique Lyon—which has dominated at home with the league title for the past SEVEN years but their European hardware list consists of the Intertoto Cup in 1997. I’d be remiss if I didn’t note that Monaco managed to be runners up in 2005. No major hardware, but they did well.

What does that have to do with uniforms? Heck if I know. I just like to get everyone in the mindset of French football. While there are plenty of the standard color schemes and designs, a few French clubs have gone the extra kilometer and come up with some nice uniforms. Let’s check them out.

Auxerre is located in North Central France. Their football team was founded in 1905. As of the 2008/2009 football season, they are saddled with some dull kits, made by Airness (which must have got that name before Michael Jordan got his nickname). Home. Away. Third Kit. When all you have is some Blue and White to work with there isn’t going to be much to say. The third kit, black with gold trim is of minor interest, but not enough to make up for their main ones. I like their shield badge well enough. A Maltese cross.

Bordeaux, or rather, FC Girondins de Bordeaux are a perennial power in French football. Bordeaux had some great years in the mid-eighties. One could say they had some “vintage” Bordeaux performances. [Okay, that will be the last of my bad Bordeaux/wine jokes in this paragraph] They have been around since the 1880’s, and it shows in their uniforms. Dark blue with white home, and white with dark blue away, and then as their third jersey they have decided on a horrific dark blue with pink highlights look. So we have dull, boring, and “hideous” as the third option. I do like the big “V” theme of the kits, and that comes from the team crest, but that cool little flare, when combined with everything else, is not strong enough.

Caen is a team in the Basse-Normandy region of France. Away. Home?. Their kit sponsors are Nike, and all seven of the people that have read my KA articles before know that I think Nike usually does a nice job with their uniform designs. The home kit has the same basic look and colors of Catalan giants Barcelona, and that does not impress me very much. I like the away kits more, because it is sort of an odd color, and the red sponsors’ logo image really brings it all together. Their shield isn’t too great as I don’t like swirly patterns that much, but it’s not bad.

Grenoble at the foot of the Alps, It looks like me saying “foot” is not a coincidence because the actual name of the club is Grenoble Foot 38. Weird huh? Check out their history on AR. The jerseys are lower down the page. I think they have a pretty nice Nike kit for the old dull white and blue combo. Why do some of the classic ‘dull’ color combinations that usually involve white look good while other ones look so bland? I guess there is some magical stripe-width ratio out there. The home jersey is nice. That link also has their black away kit. Black is plain, but effective I suppose. Their badge looks almost like something from a ski resort, and yes, it sticks to the blue and white theme.

Le Havre has an interesting combination of sky blue and navy blue on their home shirts. If you look at their shield, you’ll see where all the wavy lines came from on the jerseys. The away kit? Le Havre are another team on the hideous fluorescent second shirt—in this case, yellow. This is all brought to us by the French brand Airness. Not so sure about the Airness design team.

Le Mans…to the rest of the world it’s where that 24-hour car race is. To Steve McQueen fans (which I am) it’s also the name of a very cool/dull film of his that oozes early 1970/71. Awesome. I think he’s probably expressing the emotion of the football club’s fans to the rest of the world that doesn’t know about their respectable side. Too bad their uniforms aren’t that amazing. Red for the home kit, and black for the away shirts. Look at that black kit again and the sponsor. That’s a chicken head, it appears that Loué, the brand in question, brings the French tasty eggs and is quite excited about the newest Pink Panther movie. Make sure you check out the film for some product placement, and to feel Peter Sellers turning over in his grave. Cool thing about Le Mans is their shield. I wish their current kits were as good. Also, for the casual fan/jersey collector, they are made by Kappa, the Italian brand. Kappa makes some cool kits, but somehow they tend to look better on fit soccer players than the guys who keg it up before the game in the parking lot as they tend to reveal subtle ‘flaws’ in a person’s body (not that I’d know from experience or anything).

Lille located in the ‘far north’ of France, are having a nice season. The home kit has the ol’ red and black mix. The away kit is white with red trim. Finally, the third kit is yellow with black sleeves—that final one is the nicest one for my money. Kit manufacturers Canterbury have done a good job. The question is what about that Lille shield badge?!? What kind of dog is that? Kind of cool to have a pooch as your logo for a football team.

Lorient is located in the southern region of Brittany. They are a team with a really sweet shield. It gets top billing. Their home kits pretty much rules too. Why? Well, I like orange with black since that’s a bit uncommon, and I like the classic diagonal sash look—which is repeated on the white away uniform, and the ‘gold’ third kit. Those other two kits aren’t quite as cool, but an orange shirt and a fish snuggling with a soccer ball give Lorient high marks is the Kit Aesthetics hand book.

Monaco is a place well-known for their casinos. Like the fortunes of a gambler the team was doing pretty well for a while, regularly making trips to the more exotic locales of Europe and being runners up in the 2003-2004 Champions League after losing to Jose Mourinho’s FC Porto. That was about as good as they could get, and they currently reside in mid-table. With their previous success it was not hard to get their cool home jersey., based of a 45 degree rotation of Monaco’s flag. I tend to like Puma kits, and diagonal lines—so that one rates well even though it’s just the omnipresent color selection of red and white. The sky blue away uniforms are pretty snappy, but not all that dynamic. Still, if I was playing for Monaco along with everything else, I’d be happy to have those uniforms to wear. As Monaco is a holdover from the days of kings and what not, it’s no surprise that they have a crown on their dull team crest. Yes. We get it. Monaco, red and white flag, nice royals, et cetera. Merci Monaco.

Nancy, or AS Nancy Lorraine, is from Eastern France. The name probably sounds better in French—because it sounds a bit silly in English, and even worse if you call the team “Nancy boys.” Either way, they are still clinging onto their UEFA place, so they are quite respectable. Here is their home kit. Red and white. AGAIN. I like that there are curvy lines and flairs on the shirt, but there is still not much to work with. The away kit is black with gold stripes. Not so bad. Finally, the UEFA kit is a crisp red job with gold highlights—enjoy it while you can. I have to make special mention of their shield. Qui s’y frotte s’y pique is a French proverb that literally means “He who rubs against it gets stung.” Careful! Don’t rub against Nancy players!

Kit Aesthetics is a column by Chris Ketcham about football kits - the good, the bad and the (very) ugly. He'll be back next week with part two of his review of Ligue 1. Don't rub against him!