When a World Cup kit is good, it becomes iconic. The quadrennial nature of the competition provides limited opportunities to showcase style and national pride.
Come World Cup time, some countries, like France and Brazil, double down on their storied tournament history, choosing to always opt for the traditional over the sublime. Others, however, take their time on the world stage to exhibit what makes their own personal brand of swag.
Let's delve into the captivating evolution of the Nigerian soccer jersey, a symbol that transcends sport and embodies national identity. From its early iterations to its groundbreaking designs, we'll explore the history and cultural significance of this iconic garment.
The Nigeria football team played its first official game in October 1949, while still a British colony. In their first matches in the UK, they wore a dark green shirt. Here is a look at some of the most iconic designs throughout the years:
Early Years and Adidas Era
Nigeria's first outstanding jerseys were released in the early 1990s, when Adidas supplied the country with some typical early 1990s Adidas designs. The showcase was the 1992 African Cup of Nations played in Senegal, the design is extremely original, a bright green with which adidas took his leave of the African national team before reappearing in 2002.
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Adidas Nigeria 1992 Jersey
The Nike Revolution (1995-2002)
When Nike took over from Adidas in 1995 / 1996, Nigeria's kits got the first big notice in the world. The most boring Nigeria kits in history were likely released in second first first years with Nike after the Swoosh took over from Adidas.
During this period, Nike produced several memorable designs:
Nike, Away 1994
Nike Nigeria Away 1994
United States, 1994 World Cup, Daniel Amokachi and Finidi George. The pattern of the Away shirt. There's no need to add anything else.
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Nike, Home 1996
Nike Nigeria Home 1996
Nigeria is one of the absolute protagonists of the Atlanta Olympic Games, and even the kit does not disappoint: together with the green there is a lot of white, in the vertical band in the middle of the chest, on the sleeves on the shorts and on the socks.
Nike, Home 1998
Nike Nigeria Home 1998
At France '98, Nigeria dragged by Jay Jay Okocha, Nwankwo Kanu, Victor Ikpeba and Taribo West wins the its group but is then eliminated in the round of 16 from Denmark. And once again the shirt is something difficult to forget.
Nigeria ‘18: A Cultural Phenomenon
Enter Nigeria ‘18. When Nike revealed its full lineup of World Cup kits, Nigeria's was the obvious star. Nigeria’s triangle patterned home kit became not just the best one revealed for this tournament; it instantly became the hottest piece of soccer gear since Juventus’s Drake-modeled pink jersey from the 2015-2016 season.
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Alongside the Super Eagles’s hit jersey, Nike also released a collection of other gear, including track jackets, bucket hats, and boards shorts, all boasting the same shades of green and that distinct pattern.
Nike Nigeria 2018 World Cup Kit
The jersey looks less like a traditional soccer kit than a hyped-up sneaker-particularly the coveted Nike design seen on Acronym’s version of the Vapormax. And the response has been fitting: the jersey has been near-unanimously considered the coolest of this year’s crop ever since it was unveiled in February, and it’s turned from a piece of athletic gear to rarest-provenance streetwear.
Since that February reveal, the jersey’s picked up an alleged three million pre-orders (more on that later), sold out at Supreme box logo speeds, and is now reselling like one of those BOGO tees on the secondary market.
The Nigeria jersey provides a case study in how the streetwear internet works in 2018: cool-looking object gets hyped up endlessly until its coolness is a fact carved into stone.
Remember that just a couple years ago Drake Instagrammed himself in a pink jersey from the Italian club Juventus, bumping sales for that particular kit. When Abloh released his collection of soccer gear with Nike he noted how the sport had a defined visual identity. “The great thing about the vocabulary and history of football is that aesthetically it has its own look,” he said.
The Nigeria jerseys seem to tap into what designers already knew: soccer is fashion, or at least a sport worthy of being mined for fashion inspiration and turned into luxury soccer scarfs or streetwear-adjacent jerseys.
In the end, the standout jersey of the World Cup was only worn once. Nigeria was knocked out of the tournament on Tuesday by a cruel, late, thoroughly surprising goal by the Argentine defender Marcos Rojo.
Nigeria’s team was celebrated for its beautiful soccer and how plainly its members were enjoying playing alongside one another, but they were also the wearers of one of the most coveted sports jerseys on earth.
It’s common enough for a particular jersey, especially a one-off World Cup edition, to become a cult item among soccer fans. But Nigeria’s crossover into streetwear was swift and comprehensive.
There was a counterfeit market for Nigeria’s jersey-and a secondary market that saw it resell for three and four times its $85 retail price-before they even got a chance to wear it at the World Cup.
The Design Process Behind the Icon
To get a better sense of how an instantly-iconic World Cup kit comes to life, we hit up Nike FC’s Design Director Pete Hoppins, who is in charge of not just the jerseys worn in Russia this summer but also the apparel that brings the “story” of a country to life through soccer.
We work to a timeline, a plan...if you have to make 100,000 jerseys or a million jerseys, those jerseys have to be manufactured and shipped. We have a calendar that is over two years out from the event.
The kick-off for the process starts even earlier than that sometimes, as much as three years out. We use the big moments in time, Euros or World Cup, to rally behind a new innovation. A new aesthetic for Nike Football.
We start off working with our innovation partners within designs to create a chassis for the kit, a new innovation. That is often a fabric or yarn that’s going to increase performance; lighter weight, or faster drying than before.
To align with that innovation, we create a new aesthetic and look for Nike Football. That can be something that helps tell the story of that innovation, or a mood and feeling that we want to portray to the world. We want to also help the players feel faster and more skillful than they have ever felt before.
We get briefed by the various countries or clubs around what they want in their kit...or what they don’t want to see. We’ll always do our own research ourselves, within those countries, to capture the mood and feeling of that country and what they want to stand up for. Each country is completely different, what suits their style.
An evolution: Nigeria's World Cup jerseys
With the Nigeria kit and collection, what we wanted to do is take a team who there is less expectations on from the media and fans in terms of both on the field performance and kit design.
While no one expects Nigeria to challenge for the World Cup, we felt that there’s something going on with Nigeria as a young team. There’s a confidence in all these young players, they’re going to go for it and we were attracted to that.
Often, the kit might have an amazing story but sometimes you only have one platform to tell it. If you look at this one from a collection point of view, it’s like, “Why wouldn’t you do that?” Not everyone wants to wear the uniform, but there’s something for everybody there.
Nigeria was actually the easiest! That’s everyone having fun. We worked closer with the players and the Nigerian federation to make that happen.
A guy here named Matt Wolff, he designed this home kit. He was inspired by the classic 1994 kit with the eagle wings. We kept pushing the design and pushing it and pushing it to see how far we could go until we were like...that just looks fire.
We had this super energetic kit on a team where we think we can get it through the board. Ultimately, our client is the board, the president of Nigerian soccer has to sign off on this.
Another of our design directors here, a guy named Daniel Farron, got a team of designers across Nike and asked them, “We’ve got this kit, what else do we want to do?” He went about and helped build this whole collection using various designers to really build on the kit and create this energetic moment around Nigeria.
Everyone here thought this was the craziest thing going here, this is mad. It just hit in the media and online, it just hit in the right moment where the stars aligned with a design that resonates with people. It was the right kind of thing to do at the time.
Often, you’re dealing with an older generation to get these kits signed off on, and they won’t always go for newer ideas, even if you know that’s the thing the kids will be into.
Fair play to Nigeria though for letting us go for it. The results are amazing and Nigeria is now everyone’s second favorite team. It was about time.
Nike, Home 2018
Nike Nigeria Home 2018
Football that meets streetwear bringing with it some elements of the past: in this kit capable of reaching almost infinite heights of hype there is Naija, the new generation of Nigerian football again protagonist, again at the World Cup after a decade of absolutely anonymous jerseys.
