Are Football Shirts the Modern War Paint?

Tonight at William Hill I saw a man in a Chelsea shirt, and I asked him if he fancied his chances of winning the league this year. He looked at me a little startled, and said in a full Geordie accent "ah don't let this fool you, I'm a Newcastle fan, I'm only wearing this because I work on the roads". I was a little amused. Looking at the shirt, it does seem like Samsung have just printed their brand on a high visibility jacket, but I never imagined the shirt actually being a substitute for the genuine article.

Whilst on the subject of new football kits, what on Earth were the Liverpool Marketing team thinking when they put together this new grey kit? Grey? Was nothing learnt from Manchester United's infamous half-time change of dress against Southampton? Not only is it grey, but it's grey chequered, and in my opinion is one of the ugliest football shirts I've ever seen... but is it the ugliest shirt ever seen?

Norwich City fans may argue that having yellow as a base colour doesn't leave you many options in design, but then Brazil have never struggled in presenting themselves. This Norwich kit (adequately modelled by a then succesful Chris Sutton) is also unpleasant on the eye. However, this was the golden period of Norwich City's history, flying high domestically and in Europe, even beating Bayern Munich. Perhaps... perhaps the ugly kit is the way forward. Perhaps being aesthetically offending is the way to gain the upper hand?

Petr Cech believes so. His new orange high visibility goalkeeping shirt was designed for exactly that, "Studies say the orange colour spreads the most when the striker attacks, in the split of a second as he focuses... This colour is like a sort of alarm or alert which really spreads and is very difficult to avoid, so this should be good for me".

Science is a wonderful thing, and Chelsea's new kit could work to their advantage. But history is also a wonderful thing, and we know for certain that being aesthetically offensive did no good for Luke Chadwick's face and his career.