Football shirts: technology, colors and billions of dollars

The sports jersey worn by footballers with their teams carries many messages and is a symbol of belonging to the club and loved fans to buy it. However, in addition to the moral messages, these garments, especially "t-shirts" / shirts, are a source of abundant profit for the various parties, making the industry sector constantly evolving.

Formal design rules
All jerseys must comply with FIFA guidelines. The conference explains that some of these principles are essential, for example to prevent players' jerseys from being confused with referees.
Other rules are more detailed, such as prohibiting shirts whose design contains more than four colors, unless they are striped or tied in two equal colors. In this case, the shirt can use a maximum of five colors.

The shirt maker can also add technical design elements, but they must of course be approved by FIFA and the local federation.
To minimize the counterfeit of shirt designs, some manufacturers incorporate electronic tags into their original folders, making it easy to check if a merchant is selling real or counterfeit products. Manufacturers use teams of inspectors who shop internationally, online and at shipping ports, search for counterfeit goods and work with the local police to stop selling and exporting them.

Very special materials
Forbes explains that soccer jerseys have been designed over the years to ensure the player's comfort throughout the game, by heat or rain, to play a catalytic role in providing the best possible performance.
In recent years, companies have managed to achieve the desired comfort for the player by using engineered and modified materials, such as polyester, that can easily be adapted to the requirements of teams and players.

Designs using technology
The designed shirts are more resistant to rain and absorb very little water by a polyester shirt (about 0.4% of their weight), due to the low absorption of this fine fabric, unlike a cotton shirt that can absorb a lot of water Percentage of the weight).

When the player is warm, the shirt can help keep the body cool and dry. If sweat forms on the player's skin under the shirt, the material that forms it helps to move it away from the skin.

According to the BBC, the Italian team at the 2014 World Cup was wearing clothes capable of providing mbadage services while playing. The shirts contained a special adhesive tape that provided a "neat mbadage" to the wearer and "increased muscle strength" by allowing the body to recover more quickly from stress.

Abundant profit
But the most important aspect of the football apparel industry is the huge financial profit that manufacturers and clubs collectively make. The club receives tens of millions of dollars a year from the manufacturer, becoming the official supplier of the club. It also results in a revolution of sponsors who put their mark on the clothes of the players.

On the other hand: what are the profits of companies? According to the British newspaper "The Independent", corporate profits are multiplied by the price of the contract with the club. For example, between March and May 2017, Nike made $ 7 billion in profits from the sale of soccer jerseys. An amount that Chelsea has never won for 112 years since its inception.

(Getty)

In the English Premier League, for example, several important transactions have been concluded. Among these is the agreement reached between Liverpool and Warrior Sports in 2012, worth $ 30.35 million a year. Arsenal has signed a five-year contract with Puma after years of cooperation with Nike. The transaction was worth $ 36.42 million a year. At the end of the contract, he signed an agreement with Adidas in October for a total value of $ 365 million.
Manchester United signed a $ 912 million contract with Adidas in 2014 for 10 years. The contract between Real Madrid and Adidas has reached more than $ 1 billion over 10 years, the most expensive deal in history.