On Romanian Football: National Team Away kit 2018–2020
If you are looking, or interested, for a complete overview of Romania National kits 2018–2020 by Joma you might want to check: On Romanian Football: National Team kit 2018–2020
Below we take a closer look and focus on the away version. The red one.
Intro
For the first time in history Romania would get a personalised design for their shirts in 2017. The national team played only in adidas templates ever since signing with the German brand in 1984. And before that with Le Coq.
When signing with Joma in 2015 the first round of kits were templates as well provided by the Spanish brand. But that changed with the second generation of kits which were launched in November 2017.
There was a joint effort between Romanian Football Federation, Joma and the Bucharest-based branding agency Brandient and other intermediaries.
The creative direction such as color scheme, team crest and design motifs came from Brandient. Joma managed to transfer all of those ideas onto a brand new revolutionary shirt garment technology. The cut style of the shirt around the armpits and shoulders is different than what usually they delivered to other teams.
All of this collaboration back then made everybody happy at the Romanian Football Federation whom extended, back in 2018, their contract with Joma until 2022.
Timeline
Last games that Romania played in red kits was in 2014, for Euro 2016 qualification, against Greece and Finland.
During 2015–2017, by the time Joma already was a technical sponsor, Romania did not play any game in red. Although Joma designed and delivered an away red kit.
Debut
The debut of the second generation away red Joma kits happened in the group stage game Lithuania 1:2 Romania, 11.10.2018, counting for Nations League. Game that was held in Vilnius. Meaning there were 4 years without using the away shirts.
Romania senior team would play only one other game in the red away shirts. Against Sweden on 23.03.2019.
Future classic?
Based on impressions around the web and from my own experience with shirts I truly believe this one was a banger. I don't know how the classic football shirts sphere would look in 20 years from now but if it does continues like present day then this shirt will be seen as a classic football shirt. One that will be very sought. Rare as they mark them on eBay. Not because of the results the team had on the pitch but by the looks of it. Also a very rare match worn shirt to look for. It was used by the seniors in only the two games mentioned above. So finding it with full match details will be difficult.
The shirt is still in use, as I write this article August 2021, by the Women’s Team. But their Joma shirts have a different cut/style than the Men’s team.
It is a deadstock now. At least in Romania I don't think you could find a place to buy it anymore. It is sold out and not produced anymore.
The Romania Euro 1996 away version has reached the status of a classic football shirt which is sought by many collector these days. Below is a shop version of it with patches and font name added later on.
Long sleeve
One of my regrets, as a shirt collector and football shirt aficionado, is that Joma did not release a long version sleeve of it.
They did made a long sleeve shirt version for the home yellow shirt which was used in only 4 games. That shirt is my favorite from the Romania Joma era so far. Really thought the only thing that can top that would be the away red in long sleeve.
Details on Romania National Team away shirt
Romania National Team away 2018–2020 lookbook
Fun fact: The colours worn by the Romanian national team in the 1930s was a mystery that took many years to resolve and was not helped by the Romanian Football Federation who provided incorrect information. Part of the problem was that some contemporary photographs appear to show them in dark shirts and pale shorts while others, from the same match appear to show the reverse.
It was not until we discovered that the old fashioned orthographic film stock in common use at the time distorted the appearance of blue shades (which appear pale) and reds/yellows (which appear dark) that we were able to unravel the problem and reinterpret the teams colours as red shirts (dark) and blue knickers (pale).
Couple of years ago a contemporary press report of the Romania v Peru match from the 1930 competition was found and that these colours were finally confirmed.
After second world Romania would use the same kits. The first colorized pictures that I managed to find so far from when Romania was using yellow shirts were from the Tokyo Olympics 1964.
If you are interested in other teams historical kits I recommend: http://www.historicalkits.co.uk/
I regularly post stories about Romania match worn shirts on Instagram.
If you want to get in touch with me you can find me there as onromanianfootball:
https://www.instagram.com/onromanianfootball/
