We’ve entered the final straight of our competition to customise a pair of the new Speciali boots, with this Friday October 9th the final day for entries. The competition has been a huge success so far, with over 5,000 entries – some good, some bad, and some just plain bizarre.

In case you’ve not heard of the competition yet (if not, where have you been?!), it’s a chance to customise a pair of the new Speciali boots with a design of your choice. A team of judges that will include Michael Owen, John Terry, Gael Clichy and designer Stuart Semple will pick out the best 11 designs, which will then be made into a pair of real boots for whoever designed them. Owen, Terry and Clichy will also wear a pair of the customised boots in an upcoming match (a bit of a tip – JT is unlikely to pick a pair that take the mickey out of his infamous slip in the Champions League Final, so don’t waste your time!).

If that sounds like your type of thing but you’re unsure of where to start, take a look at some of the entries here. Here’s some of the designs that have caught our eye recently:

This one’s called The Beans Knees, and we’re not sure what we prefer: the simple but fun design, or that terrible, terrible pun.

Another simple, fun design, this one is called Legacy. Look at the bend on that shot!

This design – Broken – would look great just after you’ve smashed one into the top corner. Not so great if you broke a metatarsal…

And finally, lots of people have found inspiration in Umbro’s double diamond logo, with this design, Diamond Swirl, adding a big splash of colour.

You can take a look at all the designs over at our Flickr page – let us know which ones you’d want to wear.

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.

The latest editions, in out series of movies about the new Speciali boots see Deco and Pepe voice their opinions.  Deco used the boots in the Community Shield on Sunday, coming off the bench to assist Chelsea in their 4-1 penalties win over Manchester United.  If you are not familiar with Real Madrid’s Pepe, Soccerlens has a great blog here giving you the full lo-down on the Brazilian born, Portuguese player. 

You can see what other players have to say about the boots here:

Michael Owen
Gael Clichy
England Under 21’s
Amateur players
Talented Teens

I saw this pair of boots for John Terry in the office today and thought they might make a good blog post! Our footwear guys reliably inform me the boots he is currently wearing for Chelsea are our top spec SX Valour 2 in Navy/White/Royal. The only customisation on the boots is these embroidered tongues. John has his shirt number (26), plus the names of his two twin children, Summer (Rose) on the left and Georgie (John) on the right.