September 2009

Staff Profile: Becky Pead

Name: Becky

How long have you been here and what do you do?

I have been in the business for 14 months working as a Visual Merchandiser within the UK team focusing on Sports Direct stores. More recently, I moved to the Global Retail Marketing team where I will be looking after UK accounts and global product on a visual merchandising basis.

What would other people say you did?

Alongside my side kick people would say we are the visual link for the UK accounts. Making sure product looks ‘pretty’ and displayed in the best possible way. Also maker of a good cup of tea!

How is Umbro changing?

I am very excited about the the face of Umbro and where we are taking the brand. Umbro is becoming a modern football brand.

Where would you like to see it going?

Everywhere, total domination! To be the cool brand to be seen in would be great!

What do you think is the best/worst kit that Umbro have produced?

I love the new England shirt as it is totally different from any other shirts Umbro have designed. Even us girls can wear one and look good!

What memory of football do you hold most dear?

I remember being at college in september 2001 watching England vs. Germany in a World Cup qualifier. The atmosphere was electric with Michael Owen scoring a hat-trick and England went on to win 5-1! It was a great match and fantastic win.

If I wasn’t doing this, I’d be…

A fashion photographer! Think of those ‘A list’ swanky parties and male models!

Money makers or Money Drainers

international_cup

I watched a ‘Premier League’ under 15 game on Tuesday afternoon – partly with my Umbro scouting hat on, and partly out of curiosity as a football fan working in the football industry. At 14/15, these boys may only be a year or two from living the dream in front of a worldwide television audience with the lifestyle to match. Boots deals, pro contracts and agents are all in motion for those who have been highlighted to make it to the top – all unwanted distractions.

Having grown up in this environment, it was quite surreal to observe the future stars go about their weekly ‘work’, totally naive as to what may lie just around the corner. With the parents turning up in their droves to watch how their lad play, you could almost sense the nerves and anxiety buzzing from the sidelines. Even at this age, your performances can dictate the next ten years of your life – if not your whole career. Cold Tuesday afternoons after school, playing in front of 50 shivering parents and club officials is where the future Premier League stars play for fun, for free and without a care in the world. This is football at its purest – but it’s also where clubs, brands and agents stand to make millions.

The game was fascinating. One side were physically huge – but technically totally inept. A million miles from where Academy football wanted to be when Howard Wilkinson proposed the infrastructure and outlines for the Academy system. The other team were a joy to watch. Eight of the 11 were less than 5ft tall but were technically magnificent. They zipped the ball about like Barcelona, showed flair, composure and courage on the ball and brought a dull afternoon to light. Physically they were babies, but outplayed the team of giants beating them 5 -1. It was a pleasure to watch. These were technical footballers who were encouraged to play. Manipulating the ball, looking after the ball and comfortable in possession - it didn’t take a genius to work out that these young players had been coached and educated a certain way by the club. It didn’t take a genius to work out which club had success in producing players fit for the first team.

But as looked on, I feared for them. I feared for the best players. As ‘our’ game continues to focus on aspects of the game such as power, strength and speed – many of these fantastic little players will dissappear of the face of the face of the earth. I hear it all the time within the industry; ‘How tall is he?’ How big is he?’ – never the question ‘can the kid play?’Can he beat a man and open the defence up with a pass?’. We all watched Spain destroy England last season – a football lesson of the highest class. Players like Xavi and Iniesta who passed England into the ground that night, who are technical wizards, may not have survived in out current system based on their size. We have the players – but often we can’t seem to accomodate them?

As I walked away from the training pitch, with parents, scouts, agents, coaches and officials in tow, you could hear whispers and snippets of match reports and differing oppinions from the game. The players – many totally unaware that they may have dented or enhanced their reputation - bounced off having enjoyed a run about with their mates.

Design Room: What’s the difference?

As we have collected and displayed the huge Umbro kit archive here and on our flickr page, it has become very clear that our readers love football kits as much as we do. Everything from colours, prints and badges come under the spotlight but one thing that is constantly at the root of questioning is if, and how, the replica shirts the fans buy are different from those worn by the players. We have finally done something about the uncertainty and asked a couple of people in the know. Two people who can provide a definitive answer are Kevin and Sarah who help develop fabrics for those kits you and the players wear.

Let’s start with what Sarah had to say:

I think we could safely say that what the players wear is what is on sale in the shops. There may be some slight differences such as sometimes the Players shirt will have a different embroidery or other application than the shirt that goes in the shops. I think we have prided ourselves on delivering to the customer what the players are getting , the fabric is definitely the same for both. I know that’s not true of other brands but we like to pride ourselves on that fact.

Normally, we would feel this was fair enough, but we may have had a tip-off… ‘What about the England shirt that had the silver in it?’ we asked:

Ah! You got me on that one! That was a new technology (X-static) we decided to introduce into the new England away shirt. It had anti-microbial properties and it had a very exciting cattle-prod type tool that demonstrated the fact that there was metal in the fabric which I think sold it to us all!

We did do a player’s shirt that was fully X-static whereas in the retail version there were zonal areas that we had identified as being the areas where it needed to be X-static. I’d say that was one of the only jerseys that we did that had a difference and that was purely a cost issue because it was very expensive to produce. We just couldn’t afford to put it in a retail piece.

We were quite happy to go away with this amount of information, but Kevin let us in on another kit that had differences between what the players wore and what was seen in retail. Once again, it concerned an England kit from 2003-05 (picture at top of post) but the reason for why there ended up being two versions left us laughing for quite a while…

We did a reversible home shirt that had blue stripes on the inside which was technically brilliant, the first white reversible football jersey. The one that the players wore didn’t end up having the stripes. That was because David [kit designer] took it home and had a shower in it and the stripes were visible through the fabric. Don’t ask me why – or about his methods – but that’s what he did. It paid off though because it stopped us giving the kit to the players and the blue being visible through the white in the rain.

So that settles it. With few exceptions the Umbro players shirts are the same as the replica shirts that are sold in the shops.

Notes on a sketch pad

Tagged: Design, Football Kits, Staff

Blimey – it’s big isn’t it, this Internet? I thought that volunteering to be blasted off into cyberspace would be a pleasant affair, but once you get in front of a blank sheet of paper it becomes a bit tricky to think of what to write. Perhaps I’d be better off sticking to drawing pictures?

That, after all, is the real reason why I’m here. I’m Rob Warner, and I joined Umbro a month ago as Design Director. I’m leading the design team for our performance football clothing, including England, and am over the proverbial moon to be here. As usual in these circumstances I’ve developed “Responsibility Tourettes” and volunteered to contribute to the blog on a monthly basis, airing my thoughts on all manner of things from design through to football. Well, pretty much those two things really. That’s what you’ll most likely want to read about from me, what with you all being dedicated followers of Fashanu.

My day-to-day job involves working through trend, colour, graphics and of course the performance needs of all parties concerned (namely the clubs and players of this most beautiful of games), and people often remind me how lucky I am to be able to make a career out of something I love. I agree, and thought that the blog would be a great forum to give you some insights into what we do as a design team and how we do it, as well as offering you the chance to give us some feedback and input of your own. Let’s face it – just like football, everyone’s got an opinion on design.

I’m sure if you asked the designers they’d say that I spend all day in meetings and only appear at my desk when one of them is about to make a brew. Nothing wrong with that, though. Michael Owen’s all about being in the right place at the right time too. So long as we as a team design the best football product we possibly can then we can all go home happy, and being privy to the work which is going on here at Umbro Towers it’s fair to say we’re all feeling pretty happy at the moment. The current England home shirt is for me one of our best ever, even if my favourite is the one from Italia 90 – evoking memories of Gazza’s tears, Waddle’s mullet and David Platt’s incredulous volley against Belgium.

We’ve been involved in some pretty scary kits in the past too, though, and I’ll be doing my best to make sure that the crimes of the 80s and 90s don’t get repeated in a hurry. Unless it’s in a trendy “fashion-irony” kinda way, of course. But love them or hate them, our kits have been involved in some of the most memorable and poignant moments of football history and they’ll continue to be playing a key role in football present and future too. I’m lucky enough to have seen one of my designs win the World Cup and that’s an amazing memory for me. If England lift the trophy next summer, even though I arrived after it was designed and would be basking in reflected glory, it’d still be up there as one of my proudest moments – both as an Umbro employee and an Englishman.

For now, though, it’s back to creating our part in magical football moments that are yet to come – whether it’s Darren Bent scoring a last minute winner for Sunderland or you ‘megging Steve from Accounts in the weekly 5-a-side. It’s a tough job, but someone’s got to do it. And I really don’t think I’m cut out for being a milkman like my Dad was…

See you next month, Rob.

Derby Day

The tale of Cloughie clipping a fan around the ear for intruding on the pitch during a game was ‘classic clough’ – something that only he could do, something only he could get away with. Everyone loved him for it – but Craig Bellamy – well he’s not Cloghie and so he maybe harshly was pillored for his alteration with a United fan on Sunday.

In front of 78,000, live to a world wide audience, in a Manchester Derby, the little Welsh fireball decided nobody was interrupting this classic – and gave the pitch invading fan a good slap. His goals weren’t bad either.

Despite this altercation, this game was red hot. Goals, gaffs and Giggs. The senior citizen of United and the Premier League was simply outstanding – you wonder what his market value would be today if he was still in his twenties?£80m? What a legend. He just gets better. The Premier League is the quickest league on the planet, and Giggsy is holding up as strong as ever. The likes of Madrid and Milan must be tempted to make him an offer to play into his forties in the pedestrian environment of La Liga and Serie A.

Manchester City have certainly spent the cash, and their squad looks as strong as anyone’s – but time on the training ground is needed to Gel those boys together. After a good start – they looked open against a top four side. Once firing on all cylinders, City will be a force that is for sure. Robinho can’t even get a start!

Despite the urge to spend – home grown players add an extra edge to these type of games. Giggs and Fletcher were both massively influential on Derby day – both of whom have come from the youth system. It would have been good to see the likes of Nedum Onuoha standing strong for City at the back – just add a bit of City Blood to the array of imports. No defence would have stopped bargain buy and now United hero Owen stealing the show with his exquisite finish – did you see that Mr.Capello? Owen showed he’s still the man for the big occasion. MO showed what’s Special about the Speciali!

The classic Derby was signed off by the contrasting images of the managers. Fergie – who is usually gyrating at his watch whilst chomping away at his gum – was all smiles and cuddles for the officials. Whilst in the other technical area – Mark Hughes looked like steam was about to pour out of his ears, completely enraged by what had just happened, completely bemused that the game was still playing!

It was an absolute classic. This game has ignited the Premier League season. Monday morning in the office has presented some very happy workers, and some that have hibernated behind their laptops. You know who you are!

Dale St. Design Studio Staff Profiles: Stephen

Name: Stephen

How long have you been at Umbro?

Just over 3 months officially, but I was working for about 6 weeks before that on various freelance bits and bobs for Umbro.

What do you do at Umbro?

I’m a bit complicated… I manage the design space on Dale St, which is split into 3 sections; The design studio, where we design all of Umbro Sportwear apparel. An exhibition space where we curate all things football. And the exchange, where we will sell the hard to find, limited edition and the best of Umbro product. But I’m also a designer. I design the majority of graphics for Umbro Sportswear, and I design apparel for the premium commercial sector. I also answer the phone.

What would other people say you did ?

Eat sandwiches

Where do you see Umbro going?

As the leader in British sportswear and the pinnacle brand in football.

Favourite Umbro garment?

My first football kit, the 1988-1990 Chelsea away kit… mint green. Matt and shine jacquard shorts with tonal grey rectangles… Dope.

Least favourite Umbro garment?

Anything with the laced up collar… Yuk!

What’s your most memorable football experience?

Accidentally on purpose kicking a lad in the shin, and his mum running on the pitch chasing me down to slap me round the head… Life changing experience.

What were you doing before Umbro?

I worked for Magma Design Ltd. designing and managing their t-shirt and tote bag range. And sold my skills to whoever would take them…

What inspires you?

Coffee and cigarettes.

Did you got to design school?

Nope, self edumacated.

The Design Room: Kevin – the man who graced the Wilmslow offices at the same time as Harold…

Tagged: Football Kits

Continuing with our tales from the design room, this week I had a chat with Kev our product development manager. Kev has worked for Umbro for the past 37 years (the second longest time of any current employee) and was actually with the company at the time when the founder of Umbro, Harold himself still worked in the building.

Kev: I’ve been here 37 years. I came into the business because I wanted to be a professional footballer but I was never going to do that. Umbro was in the town [Wilmslow] that I lived so I knocked on the door and because I always interested in football and was never going to make the grade so I thought to get involved with somebody associated with football. Luckily they gave me a job. Having done a few things, I got a job in the buying office – getting fabrics etc. for our manufacturing.

I started in ’72 but probably ’78 is when I started working on kits and fabrics. Remember back then jerseys were just cotton tees.

Tom: So lets get down to business then.. There was recently an article in the guardian about the six worst football kits of all time which featured a few of ours. Can you shed any light on how these shirts came to be?

Scotland away football shirt (1991-1993)

Kev: We got hammered for that! The designer came up with it and the idea came from somebody saying you could do whatever you wanted with an away shirt – so he did.

At the time the trend was to make shirts without any shoulder seams (if you look, you can see it is made from one piece of fabric). The whole front was cut and then the design was printed.

England Third Shirt (1991-93)

Kev: This is another shirt with no shoulder seams. This process of printing gave us the opportunity to put more on the shirt than just a stripe, for example.

The process meant people went wild because they could. These shirts were made from polyester so they could take a print whereas in the past the jerseys were cotton and they couldn’t take print. Nylon also didn’t take prints very well. So polyester came and revolutionised football kits because it was easy care, you could get great colours with it, they don’t fade, can handle being put in the washing machine – suddenly you could do a lot more with it, including printing. It opened up a can of worms as far as design was concerned.

England Away Shirt (1996-1997)

Kev: With this one we had people coming to the door at Wythenshawe and wanting to know why we changed it from red to grey. The papers had fuelled it up a bit because we’d moved away from the traditional red. It was very unpopular so much so we just went back to a red kit the following season.

Manchester United Football Shirt (1997-1998, goalkeepers)

Kev: With ‘keeper kits we were given license to do pretty much what we wanted. The printing processes just made possibilities limitless.

Tom: So that’s enough of the more controversial shirts . What’s your favourite kit that you have worked on?

Manchester United Football Shirt (home, 2000-2002)

The United wool shirt was great. It was the first time wool had been used in a football jersey. It was just something different, it felt different, the players liked to wear it.

England Football Shirt (Home, 2001-2003)

Kev: I think that’s one of our iconic kits. It changed the direction of the home kits – adding the red to it. Much like the New England kit has changed the direction again. I think the new England kit is brilliant.

Tom: That’s all from Kev for now but we will be back soon with more info from the guys that work on the shirts.

On me ‘ead

Hello. The Umbro blog got a bit of a facelift today. It’s been a long time coming and the need was becoming ever greater with the main Umbro site looking so ‘fancy’. Anyway, hope you like it. Do let us know either way.

The head in the header doesn’t look like it’s been modelled on any contemporary footballer. Though who remembers Atillio Lombardo? Anyway, let’s have a little competition. There’s four (two pairs) tickets for Sunderland’s Carling Cup game against Birmingham on Tues 22nd for those of you who suggest the best bald footballers in the current game. We’ll need proof so you need to point to a photo. Answers, as usual, in the comments by Monday 21st Sept 13:00 (GMT).

Sole to sole

Tagged: boots, Design, football, Speciali

The Speciali competition to design your own boot is nearing three thousand entries (I think we’re actually on 2979 but I lost count). That’s a lot, which is great. But what we’ve loved is seeing how the submitted designs reflect different styles, reminiscent of skateboard decks and surfboards, from commentary on life and sport to plain weird s***.

As an example let’s look at some of the designs from the last few weeks:

‘Adebayor’ it’s called, can’t think why Then there’s this one from the previous week:

This time Arsenal get the boot

Then there’s stuff like this, which is just genius.

And the earlier work inspired by Marvel comics (and probably coinciding with Disney’s purchase of them).

A nod toward the Football Casuals of the 80s here:

And a classic modernist piece, which Bridget Riley would have been proud of:

This is perhaps the most thoughtful design and says so much about the type of engagement most of us have with football now:

Brilliant. And, lastly, what better way to go sliding into a 50-50 challenge than to take your fan club with you, the teenage crush etched to your sole:

You can submit your design to the competition. Umbro, Esquire and and UK designer Stuart Semple will be creating a shortlist from which John Terry, Michael Owen and Gael Clichy will be choose their favourite designs which Umbro will make for them to wear.

See the whole set on flickr and let us know which you like best.

A fan driven itinerary for South Africa 2010

So, we (England that is – commiserations Scotland and Wales) are off to South Africa! And so far there are only two other teams in Europe booked to go: Spain and Holland (who were the first to qualify). There are still another ten places up for grabs in Europe. But what about the other continents?

Africa have 53 teams competing for 5 + 1 places (the +1 bit is confusing so I’m not going to explain it). Asia have 43 teams grappling for 4.5 places. North, Central America and the Caribeean have 35 teams competing for 3.5 places. Oceania, bless them, have 35 teams going for 0.5 place! (that just doesn’t seem fair does it, not even a full place) and lastly, South America have 10 teams going for 4.5 places (a far higher ratio of places to teams). South Africa have a free pass, being the host country and all. Altogether that’s 204 countries competing for 32 places. So far (as of the 10th September) only ten places have been secured. So whilst England can relax there are still a lot of countries (not least Argentina, Portugal and France!) sweating on a place.

So, in preparation for June, we thought we’d try and kick start a “prospective travelling fans must-see itinerary of South Africa”. Catchy. We’ll start it but you need to keep adding to it, please, or it will die as swiftly as Maradonna’s managerial career. Add your ideas for the itinerary to the comments and if we start to get enough we’ll build up a proper travellers guide with maps n’ stuff.

So here’s our top 10 for a prospective football fans itinerary of South Africa (we presume you’re seeing a few football games too).

Go whale watching in Hermanus. It’s a bit early in the season for whales but you should see some. Failing that, hop on one of the many shark diving trips in the area. When you’ve finished up, head to the harbour in working Hermanus which has a couple of great fish restaurants.
They’re an outdoorsy bunch the South Africans, and they do bungee jumping. So, for people who either have no reason to live or who have been lobotomised and have no reason to think about a reason to live, this one is the biggest commercially operating bungee in the world. Try it. Wimp.
Have a drink. The SAB Centre is perhaps the best place to do that in Jo’ Burg. The local tipple Castle is good and Windhoek from Namibia is also very good. (there’s a fuller round up on wikipedia). But for the more genteel fan, you need to head over to the Winelands and celebrate (no commiserating this time around!) over a few glasses of grape.
Cape Town does seem to have more of an abundance of stuff to recommend. It’s hard to avoid Table Mountain because it’s big. The cable car is good but walking is better (but you should go in groups because there’s been a few muggings over the last few years). Perhaps take an organised walk.
Surf. In Durban on the Eastern Cape and along the many beaches of the Western Cape are some excellent surf spots. You’ll look like a pasty battery chicken compared to the buffed South Africans of course. Just challenge them to a game of football if they get all Alpha Male on you.
The Valley of 1000 Hills near Durban sounds interesting. It sounds like a Russ Meyer film . No idea if it’s any good. References to witch doctors suggest it may be worth a look.
Visit the Dynamite Museum nr Jo’ Burg. Dynamite allowed the gold industry to develop and made South Africa what it is now. Flicking through the blurb, it also seems to have been where Alfred Nobel (the man behind the Nobel prize) discovered dynamite. According to this Wikipedia article by 1903 one plant in Somerset West in South Africa was producing 340, 000 cases of dynamite annually, with each case being 50lbs in weight (17 million lbs!).
Hear the word of The Lord. Gospel is really quite uplifting and very popular. Grab a pew at one of the many churches or take a tour.
Do a safari, a ghost hunting safari. Who cares about the Big 5 anyway (especially when you’ve got to get up at the crack of dawn and train your eyes to focus on the far horizon)? If you really need to go all David Attenborough then Medikwe reserve gets lots of good reviews.
Visit the Big Hole in Kimberly. It’s big. It’s a hole. It was made a big hole by dynamite (see 7 – can you tell I’m running out of ideas…). See …

Now it’s your turn. Where would you go?

NB: if you’re after more practical advice The Times has a nice piece on tickets, flights and important stuff and The Guardian has a great interactive guide to the football venues.

Image credit: marxchivist

Umbro Blog

September 2009

Staff Profile: Becky Pead

Money makers or Money Drainers

Design Room: What’s the difference?

Notes on a sketch pad

Derby Day

Dale St. Design Studio Staff Profiles: Stephen

The Design Room: Kevin – the man who graced the Wilmslow offices at the same time as Harold…

On me ‘ead

Sole to sole

A fan driven itinerary for South Africa 2010

From The Terrace

Clubs

The World at Your Feet

Honours

Categories

Pundits

Referee’s Rule Book

Photos

September 2009

From The Terrace

Clubs

The World at Your Feet

Honours

Categories

Pundits

Referee’s Rule Book

Cloud

Photos