Manchester City has given its fans much to talk about with the arrival of Erling Haaland from Borussia Dortmund and Julian Alvarez from River Plate.
To add to the discussion, along with Puma, they released their 22/23 season home kit towards the end of May. The new home jersey has the usual light blue colour, however, the sleeve cuffs provide a different aesthetic. Both the shoulder and neck area has a white ring bordered on both sides with two maroon rings.
Images have surfaced on the internet hinting that the shorts won’t be matching the shirt colour next season. In the image, one can see maroon shorts below light blue Phil Foden shirts.
Some fans did not understand why their shorts weren’t in traditional white. It is strange for different coloured shorts to be lined up with the full home kit.
— Manchestericonic™ (@manchestriconic) June 3, 2022
Others stepped in to point out that these were in all likelihood alternate shorts. Alternate shorts are used on rare occasions when jerseys of two teams clash heavily.
One can go back to 1990 when City used maroon alternate shorts against Aston Villa. As per museumofjerseys, City had to wear their home kit as their away shirt matched the maroon aesthetic of Villa’s home jersey.
However, wearing the home kit meant that the two teams now clashed because of their white shorts. The Manchester club decided to wear their away shorts in maroon as an alternative. Thus came about the now to be repeated light blue shirt and maroon shorts combination.
The alternate shorts will most likely be used against teams like Chelsea, whose colours match those of City’s. This combination of light blue and burgundy may bring back good memories to older fans.
Superstitious values linked with fond memories are often attached to jerseys. However, with how the current City side is, they won’t need the luck which seems to come with alternate shorts to beat their opponent.
