Arsenal officially released their ‘25-’26 blue away kit ahead of wearing it on the pitch for the first time in Wednesday’s preseason opener against A.C. Milan in Singapore. The Gunners will also wear it against Newcastle on Sunday, July 27th. The club released the home stripe in May. Pictures of the white third kit have leaked but the jersey isn’t expected to be officially released until August.
I must say the release video isn’t as good as the recent Arsenal x adidas productions. I guess they can’t
all be bangers. I do appreciate the kaiju movie references given the preseason tour in Asia. The club’s post about the inspiration for the kit spouted some waffle about “supporters make the players feel 100ft tall” to explain the giant footballers stomping through major cities around the world. The kaiju bit is better. I want the deleted scene of Giant Gabriel fighting Mothra.
The kit reminds me of the 2021-22 third kit, which itself was a callback to the mid-90’s away jerseys. The pattern is inspired by the Royal Arsenal Gatehouse lightning bolt. I’ll admit I looked long and hard at the picture of the gatehouse to find said bolt and was unsuccessful. It’s on the crest. Speaking of crests, the jersey features the cannon emblem rather than the club crest, which returned to the home kit this season. Big fan of the cannon on the shirt.
By way of a bit of a history lesson, the club that would become Arsenal was founded in 1886 as Dial Square Football Club by a group of munitions workers at the Royal Arsenal in Woolwich, which is in south east London. A few months later, the club was renamed Royal Arsenal and changed again to Woolwich Arsenal in 1893. The club moved to North London, Highbury, in 1913 and started calling themselves just “Arsenal” around that time.
I’ll need to see this kit in action before I pass final judgement. I don’t love the light blue lightning bolts coalescing into peaks / points running up the middle of the jersey. That looks odd and more mountain-y than bolt-y. Some might like the red stripes on the shoulder that add a pop of color and variation from the very blue shirt. They’re striking, for sure. It looks a bit forced and out of place to me, although the more I look at it the more it grows on me. I prefer the integration of the red into the lightning bolt pattern from the ‘21-’22 third kit and I suspect I’ll like that kit more overall.
There’s also a basic issue. In football, you’re either a red or a blue. I’ve softened that stance when it has come to third kits because I feel strongly that clubs should go for it with out there designs. I’m not sure I can abide a red home kit and a blue away one.
Either the red jersey or the leaked white shirt will be my favorite this season. The red shirt is clean. This away kit feels more like a third kit, which is where clubs are meant to get a little wild with designs. It’s neat that Arsenal have gone for that look with the away shirt — we’ll see plenty of it this year.
Will that change be refreshing or will we get tired of the frequency of the avant-garde look and long for a more traditional, simple feel? I really don’t know! I often find myself wishing Arsenal would wear their third kit more often, but you can have too much of a good thing.
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