With just two days until the new Premier League season kicks off, we’re all excited about the return of England’s top division. We’re also excited about the return of one of our favourite things from last season – the Umbro Playlist. A competition run by Umbro and Manchester City on Facebook, it offers fans of the club a chance to win a pair of tickets to each league home game throughout the season.

In order to be in with a chance of winning the tickets, you’ve got to show off your musical good taste – or lack of! You’ve got to pick three songs that fit with a certain theme we choose for each game, with the best trio of tunes bagging the tickets for the big match. Not only that, but your songs will be played before the game in the ground, so everyone will be able to voice their opinion on your choices.

Last season we had some great tunes picked out by the musical-minded City fans, but we’re sure that there’s plenty more to come during the 2010/2011 season. City kick things off at home on August 23rd with a big match against Liverpool in front of the TV cameras, and the Umbro Playlist will also be sparking back into life for that game.

Apparently it’s still summer here in the UK, despite the rain that’s currently lashing down here in Manchester! With that in mind, the theme we’ve chosen to kick Umbro Playlist off with this season is: summer songs. They can mention holidays and sunshine in the lyrics or just have a sound that takes you back to summers past – we just want you to send us your top three choices via our special Umbro Playlist Facebook page. Click on the link, get your choices down and tell us why you’ve picked them out, and you could win a pair of tickets for City against Liverpool. Good luck!

There’s been plenty of action at Eastlands already this pre-season, and fans will be itching to see how the team’s lining up for 2010/2011 – what player’s they’ll have, what system the manager will play and, most importantly – what the new kits will look like! We can give you a sneak peak today by offering a live stream of the club’s open training day, which is taking place at the City Of Manchester stadium.

From 3pm today, you’ll be able to watch City’s squad in action via the video here, which is streaming live action from the event. If you know anyone that’s gone down there, you might even be able to spot them in the crowd!

Click here to watch the video:

After a year in Birmingham and a summer spent in South Africa, goalkeeper Joe Hart has returned to Manchester City to battle for the club’s spot between the sticks. Here’s a quick interview with Joe, in which he chats about his recent experiences, and looks ahead to the forthcoming season…

As they gear up for what’s sure to be an exciting season, Manchester City have revealed their new home kits, Tailored by Umbro for 2010/2011. The new kit, inspired by some of City’s classic shirts of the past, matches a smart, tailored look with the best in performance technology to ensure that the club’s players and fans will be the most stylish in the Premier League this season.

Alongside the home kit, Manchester City have also revealed a beautiful new jacket inspired by one of the club’s classic managers.

It’s the home shirt that immediately catches the attention though. In City’s classic sky blue, the shirt features a subtle needle out pinstripe on the front panel, adding an extra level of smart tailoring to the design.

The sleeve and underarm panels are crafted with performance in mind, built to aid movement and ventilation and to give the wearer more confidence when they step out onto the pitch. Constructed using a motion-stretch fabric, the sleeves on both the short and long sleeve version of the shirt feature white cuffs, a nod to the classic City shirts of the 1970s.

One of the most interesting elements of the shirt is its special ergonomic shape, which is designed to fit the player’s stance on the pitch, keeping the wearer comfortable at all times.

Putting all these elements together, the shirt features smart dart shaping on the back, and a simple crew neck collar.

Many City fans will also be excited to see the Mercer jacket, an extra piece of apparel in the range inspired by an Umbro-jacket that the club’s legendary manager wore in the 1960s and 1970s. In sky blue with a blue, white and maroon trim, the jacket is made using the same three-panel system as the club’s onfield kits. The Mercer jacket also has some special touches of its own – the stitched letters on the back of the jacket are created using a bespoke 3D technique – look closely and you’ll see the team’s full name intricately crafted into the letters.

It’s these intricate elements that run throughout the new Manchester City kits that make them so special. With plenty of assets to enhance their performance, the new Manchester City kits also find a way for this to co-exist with a smart, tailored look. Style and top performance – the two essential components of any winning team. For a closer look at all of City’s new wardrobe, head over to our special Flickr group – and if you want to order the shirt, head over to City’s site now.

Yesterday we showed you the first official pictures of the new Manchester City away kit, which the club will be sporting throughout the forthcoming 2010/2011 season. The club launched the shirt with a quick kickabout against some local footballers during their trip to New York – you can imagine their surprise when a team full of stars turned up and challenged them to a match!

Here’s a great video highlighting some of the action from the game, which featured City players Joe Hart, Emmanuel Adebayor, Micah Richards, Dedryck Boyata, Shaun Wright-Phillips, Wayne Bridge and Kolo Touré taking part in this one-off game. It showcases the new away kit, in dark navy blue with a flash of sky blue, tailored to City’s specifications, superbly:

As we showed earlier, Manchester City’s new away kit for the 2010/2011 has been revealed as part of their trip to downtown Manhattan in New York. So what’s the shirt all about? Here’s a closer look at how the kit has been Tailored by Umbro to City’s specifications.

Smartness, confidence and performance are the key components of the new strip, typified by the subtle pinstripe on the front panel of the shirt.

The away kit comes in a stylish dark navy blue, with flashes of City’s classic sky blue featuring on the open v-neck collar, so that a little bit of Manchester travels with the players and fans wherever they may go.

The shirt is constructed from three distinct panels, that are each tailored to the distinct needs of that part of the body. Movement, ventilation and comfort are all provided where required, and combined into a unique ergonomic shape that inspires confidence in the wearer.

Inspired by the increased use of baselayers amongst top players, the sleeves on the shirt are constructed using a motion-stretch fabric to provide the movement that players need. The shirt is available in both short and long sleeve versions, with the long sleeve featuring sky blue cuffs – a nod to City’s classic kits from the 1970s.

The smart look continues throughout the kit, with even the socks being designed with performance in mind. With sky blue hoops on a navy background, the socks are designed to make team mates appear more clearly in a player’s peripheral vision.

Combining the best in performance technology with a smart, stylish look, Manchester City’s away kit will ensure that the players and fans look their best when representing the club away from home. For more pictures of the new kit, take a look at our Flickr page here. If you want to pre-order the new City away kit for the forthcoming season, head over to mcfc.co.uk now.

Every football player thinks that they can take on the best, but some lucky New Yorkers had the chance to put this theory to the test last night when they took on some of Manchester City’s finest players in an impromptu kick-about on their home pitch. To officially launch their smart new away kit, a small City squad including Joe Hart, Emmanuel Adebayor, Micah Richards, Dedryck Boyata, Shaun Wright-Phillips, Wayne Bridge and Kolo Touré arrived at Sara D. Roosevelt Park yesterday afternoon to play against some local footballers.

Sporting the new navy blue away kit, City’s squad surprisingly drew 1-1 against the team of New Yorkers, although we have heard reports that by the end of the game the professionals were ‘toying’ with their American opponents! After the first match, City’s players also rewarded their loyal fans from Britain who had travelled over to follow their tour of New York by taking them on in another game.

The new away kit, Tailored by Umbro for the forthcoming 2010/2011 season, is a smart navy blue strip with flashes of City’s traditional sky blue. We’ll be taking a closer look at the kit itself soon, so head back here for all the insight into what makes this kit so great. To pre-order the kit, head over to the City website now.

Any young Manchester City supporters fancy showcasing their skills this summer? The club are running a number of special Soccer Schools later this month, giving young fans the chance to brush up their skills during the summer holidays – and we’ve got some free places on these schemes to give away!

The CITC Soccer Schools will be taking place at the MCFC Academy on Platt Lane here in Manchester, close to where the club’s Maine Road stadium used to stand. We’ve got ten places at each of the following two courses to offer to any budding footballers aged between 5 and 14:

Monday July 19th to Friday July 23rd
Monday July 26th to Friday July 30th

At the course you’ll take part in warm up games, small sided matches, fun tournaments and technique training. You’ll get the chance to test all your skills – passing, dribbling, shooting, attacking, defending and all aspects of goalkeeping will all form part of the course. The sessions are designed to inspire confidence in young players and give them the key skills to help them reach their full potential.

Those taking part will have the opportunity to learn how to play like their favourite players, as they are taught the same techniques which have made those players some of the biggest names in football.

The sessions take place every day, and no transport will be provided, so it’s really only available to fans in the Manchester area.

So do you know any young Blues that would like to take part? If so, email us on blog@umbro.com for more details on how you can get involved. You’ve got until 9am on Wednesday, July 14th to apply for a place.

Alongside the big match at the City Of Manchester Stadium last night, Umbro and Manchester City were conducting an interesting experiment with the new social media platform Foursquare.

We were looking to get as many people as possible checked into the stadium during the match, and we got a big response from fans in and around the ground. Thanks to everyone who logged on and checked in – we got over 100 people, which is a great achievement. It means that everyone involved unlocked the ‘Swarm‘ badge on Foursquare, a trophy that’s pretty hard to come by, as it’s only awarded to groups of over 50 people. Hopefully, for those of you that are new to Foursquare, it also gave you an idea of what it’s all about, and you’ll be checking in everywhere you go now!

Unfortunately, we didn’t break the record for the most people checked in to one place at one time, but as it’s still early days for our Foursquare experiments, we still think we did pretty well. We’ll definitely be doing more with Foursquare next season, so if you didn’t manage to log on, you’ll have plenty of chances to do so in the future.

For those that were there last night however, there was the chance to win a prize for checking in at Eastlands. We picked eleven winners at random from the people who checked in on Foursquare, and they all win an Umbro Blue Moon T-Shirt. Congratulations therefore go to….

Mat Payne

Sarah R

Richard Hampson

Stephen Davies

Mark Thompson

Lizzie Halfpenny

Victoria Thompson

John Labuzan

Danny Maycock

Paul Ashwin

Nigel G

If you’re one of these lucky winners, please email us on blog@umbro.com for details on how to claim your prize. Thanks again to everyone who entered, and keep your eyes peeled for more great competitions here on the Umbro Blog…

Manchester City take on Tottenham on Wednesday in what could easily be described as the club’s biggest game for years – especially after Saturday’s big win against Aston Villa. The main thing on City’s minds is grabbing the vital win that could help clinch that all important fourth spot, but we’re also looking to get involved in something else that could be pretty big.

Heard of Foursquare? It’s a new application that looks set to be the next big thing, following in the footsteps of Facebook and Twitter. Basically, it’s a location-based programme for smart phones – you ‘check-in’ to places, check out what your friends are up to, and discover handy tips about the place. Check in at a restaurant, and you might get tips about what to order off the menu. Check into a hotel in a foreign city, and you can find out what cool things you can do nearby. You can download it for iPhone, Blackberry, Palm Pre and Android.

It’s a really cool new toy to play with, and we want to see if we make a little bit of history at Eastlands on Wednesday night. We want to create the biggest number of people all checking in the same place that Foursquare has seen so far. The biggest total up to now is only a few hundred people, so with 48,000 crammed into the City Of Manchester Stadium, we should be in with a great chance of breaking the record. While you’re there, you can also become friends with both Manchester City and Umbro, so you keep an eye on what we’re up to.

All you need to do on Wednesday to play your part is to login to Foursquare whilst you’re at the ground and check in at the City Of Manchester Stadium – search for it nearby and it should come up on your smartphone. While you’re there, you can add some tips to fellow visitors, or check out who else has logged in – you never know, you could discover that the person sat next to you is also checking out the action online. If being part of a little bit of history wasn’t enough, we’re also offering the chance to win a special bit of Man City memorabilia as well – a limited edition Blue Moon t-shirt. Just add the phrase ‘Umbro Blue Moon Tee Please’ to the tips section once you’ve logged in, and you could be in with a chance of winning one of 11 special shirts.

On the pitch, City are pushing for something pretty momentous on Wednesday. In the stands, you could play your part simply by logging on!