Turquoise tones have become increasingly popular in kit circles over the past few years, so continuing our look at some of the best kits of the past year, here’s 5 of our favourite fresh mint kits from 2019.
The cool-colour usually stands out well on a football pitch and transitions well to the terraces making it popular with players and fans alike.
As these shirts show, mint kits come in various flavours and are still at the stage where just using a pastel shade is enough to tantalise our taste-buds.
Perhaps we’ll see more variation in design in 2020, but for now, we salute the use of spearmint shades in the world of Sartorial Soccer.
MLS Earth Day Shirts
MLS teams turned spearmint for their annual “Greener Goals” environmental awareness day back in April, wearing shirts symbolising the depth of our oceans.
For the Earth Day weekend each round of fixtures saw home teams play in “Blue Spirit” shirts, whilst away sides wore darker “Legend Ink” kits.
Each Adidas kit was made using Parley’s technique of spinning reclaimed plastic bottles from the seas into polyester.
Never mind the air miles clocked-up in a regular MLS season, or the question marks around whether Parley actually go around fishing rubbish out of the sea; our favourite shirt from the weekend’s fixtures was this Minnesota United effort that paired club crest, sponsor and colour scheme to perfection.
Real go Teal
Real’s all-white home shirts are becoming so repetitive and uninteresting that Adidas are saving their artistry and inspiration for the Spanish giants’ change kits.
Let’s not proclaim this teal Madrid shirt to be anything too radical.
The generic Fly Emirates sponsor means this looks like one of Puma’s Arsenal away shirts, and let’s be really honest; the imposition of FIFA’s Club World Cup winning badge has ruined another lovely Adidas kit.
Putting those gripes to one side, this is a neatly cut shirt with clean lines and smart trim details that appeals to our Sartorial.Soccer sensibilities.
QPR’s Polo Mint Away Shirt
Errea’s 2019-20 QPR away kit is a particularly smart affair, but technically speaking, there are some holes in this polo collared mint kit.
Firstly, we have to question the logic of giving a club with blue and white hooped home shirts a light blue away kit. For evidence of why QPR should always have a darker strip in their kit bag, witness the colour clash at Elland Road when the R’s looked washed out against Leeds United.
Secondly, we’ve never been overly enamoured by the pasting of the Royal Panda obligatory online-betting sponsor across QPR’s otherwise beautiful shirts.
We don’t subscribe to the view that plain kits and polo collars are dull and uninspired, if this kit with its smart gold details was Rangers’ third kit and associated with glory, we may be looking at a club classic.
Mint-er Milan
Inter Milan’s away kit by Nike is one of three amazing designs the Nerazzurri have had the pleasure of wearing this year.
Perennial sponsors Pirelli are positioned in the middle, whilst trim details in black and gold set-off beautifully amidst these astonishing aquamarine shirts that take inspiration from designs previously worn by Brazilian goalkeeper Julio Cesar.
A breath of fresh air.
Caversham United Competition Kit
Finally, let’s shift our gaze to Sunday league heroes Caversham United whose Twitter competition to draw-up a new away shirt spawned this beauty from French designer Saintetixx.
The Billy Goats have partnered with footballkitbox.com and Moving Forward Sports to bring the design to life and the boys from the banks of the River Thames will soon be wearing this wavy away strip with pride in the Reading & District Sunday League.
Sartorial Soccer 