What happened to stiff upper lip? Redesign of England jersey has soccer fans, politicians throwing fits

In less than 100 days, England's national soccer team will take to the pitch at the 2024 Euro Cup. But many fans have been focusing their attention not on the players' potential brilliance on the ball, but the shirts on their backs.

When the newest edition of the team's uniform (referred to as a "kit" in the U.K.) was unveiled on March 18, many observers seemed to like the simple, elegant design.

The home kit is the same quintessential white shirt that's become synonymous with English football, and features the traditional Three Lions crest. It's also accented with striped sleeve cuffs and a retro blue collar, a tribute to the style of shirt the team wore in 1966, when it last won the World Cup.

But it was a small detail on the back of the collar that sent many people into fits.

The design overhauls the classic colours of England's national symbol, St. George's Cross. Rather than the traditional red and white, it is rendered in red, pink, and varying shades of blue.

Nike, which sponsors the uniform, described this new rendering as "a playful interpretation of the flag" designed "to inspire and unite players and fans alike around the game."

For many, the design choice had the opposite effect.

"This cross has represented England for over 800 years … surely if you want to inspire and unite the country, you use their flag," said one user on TikTok.

An online petition with nearly 50,000 signatures is calling for Nike to change the shirt, saying the redesign has "deeply offended English fans."

Former players and even the prime minister have weighed in.

David Seaman, who was a goalkeeper for England from 1988 until 2002, expressed his distaste for the new design on a U.K. sports radio station last week. "It's not broken, it doesn't need fixing! What's next, are we going to change the Three Lions to three cats? Leave it alone!"

A ripe political climate

National politicians were eager to weigh in on the debate, taking to talk shows and social media to voice their consternation.

"I prefer the original," said Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. "My general view is that when it comes to our national flags, we shouldn't mess with them."

In a rare show of unity, Sir Keir Starmer, the Labour Party leader, echoed Sunak's sentiment, even going so far as to request that Nike recall this version of the uniform.

"The flag is used by everybody, it's unifying, it doesn't need to change. We just need to be proud of it. So I think they should just reconsider this and change it back," Starmer said.

While it might seem like a trivial matter for the prime minister and the opposition leader to comment on, analysts say this was always going to happen — especially in an election year.

"I think politicians are, at the moment, in the U.K., keen to capitalize wherever they can on ways in which they can appeal on populist-type things, such as sport. The types of things that get the person in the street a little bit angry," said Stuart Whigham, a senior lecturer at Oxford Brookes University in Oxford, England.

Whigham, who specializes in the field of sociology and the politics of sport, says that as the country gears up for a national vote later this year, the two political opponents would be particularly keen on appealing to the parts of the electorate that are "empowered and agitated by issues of identity around the nation and Englishness."

"The English football team, in some ways, is one of the main vehicles for the expression of English national identity … but what's interesting about this circumstance is that there's been numerous plays on the England flag in the past with England kits," he said. "It's never really got the same level of furor."

One example is graphic designer Peter Saville's work on the 2010 national team jersey.

New jersey too 'woke' for some

One popular theory behind the widespread distaste for the new kit is the resemblance Nike's adaptation of St. George's Cross bears to Jennifer Pellinen's design of the transgender pride flag.

"There's a minority of people that are automatically relating it to [the pride flag] because of the colours," said Mikey Connor, a semi-professional football referee and member of the LGBTQ+ Professionals in Football Collective. "I think the scary thing is there's no part of the St. George's Cross on the Nike kit that is related to the LGBTQ community."

The fact that people are reacting to the mere suggestion of a connection between the kit redesign and Pellinen's trans pride flag says a lot about where society is at when it comes to inclusivity in men's football, said Connor.

"Can you just imagine for a moment if there is an England player in the squad right now who is maybe gay, who is maybe bisexual, or another part of the LGBT community, and this is what the scene is in relation to a small little flag on the back of the collar?" 

Connor, who identifies as gay, says this atmosphere is a big part of why there are so few out men in professional football, because closeted players may not feel like they would be accepted if they came out. (As of May 2022, there was only one openly gay footballer in England's top four men's divisions.)

Performance over appearance

Nike has not confirmed any intentional alignment with the trans pride flag or a broader encouragement of diversity — unlike the Euro tournament's host nation, Germany, which recently unveiled its pink and purple away kit, a departure from the historically green shirt. 

"The new away kit is meant to represent the new generation of German football fans, as well as the diversity of the country," the German Football Association (DFB) said in a statement last week.

Adidas, which has been the DFB's kit supplier for more than 70 years, even posted a video online poking fun at the potential blowback the new design would receive.

"Sport and nationality remain a kind of microcosm of some of the bigger political debates and political climate," said Whigham, adding that ultimately, it's the team's performance on the pitch that matters most to fans.

He said the catch is a team needs to do well in order for the small grievances to be forgotten.

England are widely favoured to win the tournament, but this was also the case ahead of the 2020 Euros, when the team made it to the final, only to lose on penalties. After three young Black players on the England squad missed their penalty shots, they were on the receiving end of widespread racial abuse on social media.

Whigham says when teams aren't successful, "we see the worst sides of football fans coming out … everyone looks for someone to blame."

But for Mikey Connor, nothing could be bigger than the sport he says he would die without. He has already bought the new edition of England's football shirt and wore it proudly while speaking to CBC News from his home in Liverpool.

"It's crisp, it's fresh and it really represents who England are," said Connor.

"Come June, when England are walking out onto the pitch, I'll be supporting them. It doesn't matter what kit they're in, they're my team."