Well that was unexpected. What a warm up to the biggest England game in I don’t know how long. Uruguay out! Brazil out! The new Brentford home shirt – out! And there’s a new signing to boot, with attacker Mohamed Saïd Benrahma joining from OGC Nice. All of which were brought to us in quite unique social media styles – a fan announcing the kit and Saïd (as he is apparently better known) announcing himself to a fan.
#WelcomeSaïd (sorry – we don’t do that anymore. Thankfully)
First up, Brentford. The new shirt. No sooner had I got home from picking up mine and HB’s away shirts from the club shop than the phone went off. And again. And again. Something was clearly afoot.
Whilst we’d been given the home shirt teaser photo in the morning, with a promise of the big reveal on Monday, the club had gone early. Or, rather, supporter Lucy Draper had after dropping this tweet mid-afternoon……
Wow. As a means of doing this it was a great idea. Out of nowhere and via a fan rather than a week of snippets and moody looking shadow drenched pictures that no amount of fiddling with photoshop can enhance to reveal more clues. Been there, done that and it’s a lot of time that can never be got back. I have to be honest that, much like novelty hashtags, the tease routine is starting to feel as though it has had it’s day. Just rip it off and show us your kits, Brentford.
Well, the club would seem to be heading in that direction and we now know what we’ll look like in 2018/19. If it was love at first sight for the beautiful brown and orange, I’m more cautiously reserved when it comes to the home variant. The gut reaction for me was one of personal anti-climax. White sleeves and not enough black trim. Barely any (and that’s assuming the Draper family weren’t all wearing low cut black vests). All this before we’d even seen the red back.
Yet, seeing it as the match action photos from our game at Boreham Wood began to come in later that evening I have to say it started to grow on me. The all white sleeves looking better and the black shorts helping break it up more.
Much better in full frontal
The problem being, of course, that full kit w@nkers aside, no supporter goes out on match day wearing much more than replica shirt and jeans. Perhaps it’ll be a case of breaking out the black wranglers rather than the blue next season.
For me (Clive) there’s just a touch too much of 1970s Arsenal about it. The red back, the white sleeves, the red trim. With a striped back this could have been superb. Instead, with the all red derriere (thanks, Adidas) it looks almost like two different kits mangled together. Something that became more apparent as we saw those ‘side on’ / reverse shots. ‘A cut and shut’ as one New Road observer would later opine.
That said, supporter opinion on social media seemed to be generally in favour and it’s impossible to please everybody. Likewise, in this era of clubs changing shirts every campaign there’s only so much you can do to update red and white stripes. Only so much you can do for the likes of Brentford, Sheffield United and Sunderland to not look as though they are wearing some variant of each other’s back catalogue – even if the Arsenal look was one that Adidas have dropped on us.
With the club’s current deal with our kit partner due to expire at the end of this season, and assuming a new contract hasn’t been signed already, perhaps a clause insisting on a striped back might be the way forward with whomever our next supplier is. Adidas or other.
One shirt – two teams?
Ultimately, it’s a shirt. An absolutely key part of the club and our heritage but at the same time, there could be a lot worse things to happen. I’ve loved many before. I’ve hated others on sight. This one falls somewhere in the middle. Having told people to reserve full judgement on the away until they see it, now is the time to take that advice myself.
Perhaps this one will prove to be a grower in our house. One really does hope so as with the away shirt proving a classic (and HB wanting to wear his to bed last night – that wasn’t happening), how nice to have a pair of iconic kits to celebrate our journey to the Premier League.
The away shirt is a ratings winner in TW8
If choosing a fan to reveal our shirt was a novel touch, there was more to come. With speculation about the signing of Saïd Benrahma rife on social media this week, the player himself revealed his arrival – direct to supporter Ryan Gaffney after he’d questioned whether a signing really was imminent. Albeit with the full story coming shortly after on official (and you can read that one here).
This sort of thing is great. Like sending away shirts and jaffa cakes in the post to those whose first reaction wasn’t favourable, the club are really driving fan interaction to a new level. Gone are those awful hashtags – farewell #trophfyriends and #Novemberkings – and instead we have fans right at the heart of the action. No staid press release but instead a devastatingly refreshing break from the norm.
Traditionalists may not agree. Personally I’m loving what we are doing here although don’t deny it is a tricky line to stay the right side of. As noted by one observer (below). But if you can get it right, what a great tool. Social media is well and truly here to stay – let’s embrace it.
Next up. The World Cup. The trophy IS coming home. Or, at least for now, to Europe. Brazil and Uruguay both crashed out last night (I would also accept: ‘limped’) to Belgium and France respectively. Now’s the chance for England to go again.
It promises to be shirt launch levels of excitement. Pubs full, barbecues sizzling and supermarket beer shelves cleared. That’s just Gareth Southgate’s big match build up routine.
In all seriousness though, I can’t wait. The World Cup is always huge and with England one of just six teams left alive, the excitement sweeping the nation is palbable. Everybody knows what is at stake and with football already having been formally declared to be packing her cases for the flight back to England, it would be fair to say that optimism levels are through the roof.
There’s not much else to say on that really. It’s all about the anticipation for now.
Wherever you watch it, enjoy. No doubt he game will provide a story and some sort of discussion point come 6pm.
This is England, it always does.
Scenes we’ll be hoping to avoid later today
Nick Bruzon
All of which brings us with sledgehammer like unsubtlety to the Last Word season /five-season reviews which remain available for download. ALL proceeds received are being donated to the Brentford FC Community Sports Trust so why not help out this wonderful part of our club whilst providing yourself with some relief for the commute, the bathroom or just whilst relaxing on holiday.
Ten Times Better. Brentford FC Season review: 2017/18. Inspired by ‘that’ interview it contains the least bad of these columns in one, handy volume as it looks at our own campaign as well as wider divisional life and the promotion / relegation races.
As a bonus there’s a whole host of new material. New that is, for my pages. Specifically, all the programme articles submitted (both home and away where, if nothing else, you can get the original versions of both Birmingham City and Millwall).
In addition, There Is No Plan B. Brentford FC Season reviews: 2013/14 – 2017/18 takes us all the way back to the start of this latest leg in the journey. That penalty. League One. Harlee Dean was a hero. Jota was something we thought happened to the temperature for one week in July. Alan Judge had joined on loan whilst the Marinus Experiment was something nobody had contemplated. Bringing things bang up to date by the inclusion of this year’s volume alongside the four previously published campaign round ups, it has five seasons in one weighty tome. As weighty as a download can be, that is.
Relive the memories. See how often the same material gets regurgitated. Remind yourself how it all began.
BrentfordFC 