Campo Retro’s The Empire Jersey Red / Old White L/S.
Max Munton explains how a shirt from retro re-inventors Campo Retro can spark the nostalgia some fans never had in the first place.
It’s not easy being a Liverpool fan born in the mid-1980s.
It’s like queuing up at a ticket office for hours, only to be told the person in front of you got the last one and having the shutters slammed in your face.
You just missed out on “the glory days”. Sorry, go away, we’re not coming back for a while.
Even more excruciating is the fact that Liverpool have won league titles in your lifetime — 1986, 1988, but you’re still too young to remember the last triumph in 1990.
The expectation remains. You grow up learning about this glorious history of a team that played in red and navigated Europe collecting silveware.
You discover how Bill Shankly came down from Scotland with an ideology and philosophy about how a club should be run, and changed Merseyside forever.
You’ve seen the footage — how Kenny Dalglish could turn on a sixpence and how Kevin Keegan had some sort of telepathic relationship with John Toshack, all in front of the background of a roaring Kop.
You’ve heard the old men recalling how the Kop used to sway, the away days were an adventure and that it’s “just not the same anymore” as if to rub salt into the wound.
2005’s triumph in Istanbul gave some sort of glimpse into what it was all like, but Dalglish stepping into the manager’s hot seat for a second time in 2011 to finish a job he started over 20 years previously was a false dawn. A time machine that never quite worked.
Hope. Faith. The two things synonymous with being a Liverpool fan on many levels. It’s why we do it. It’s why we still go to the match every other Saturday.
So when Campo Retro’s Empire Jersey Red shirt landed through the letter-box, a little bit of nostalgia came with it.
Packaged in the style of old newspaper wrapping, decorated by the legends of the beautiful game, it’s clear that much thought has gone into this. It’s a special product that requires that sort of special touch.
Packaging: The beautiful game requires a beautiful touch.
The shirt itself is beautiful. No logos, no branding, not even a glimpse of that evil machine we call “modern football”.
This is a throwback to the late 1960s and ‘70s. It screams Liverpool with the rounded white collar, long sleeves and rounded white cuffs.
It evokes memories of (being educated on) Ron Yeats, Ian St John and Ian Callaghan.
A throwback to the 1960s and ’70s.
The colour is a true Liverpool red and looks glorious in the sunshine as I walk down Walton Breck Road towards Anfield in anticipation of Liverpool’s Premier League clash at Tottenham.
“Premier League” – there’s those words again. It seems so manufactured. So plastic. The shirt pulls me back to a time where aesthetics mattered — the very reason why Shankly switched Liverpool to all red. There’s no “Standard Chartered” or “Warrior” here, it’s about me, my shirt, my colours and my love for the football club that stands in front of me.
The fabric is soft, of high, high quality and the added touch of a hole for a pin badge of my choice gives the shirt a special bond between myself and the club.
A hole for a pin badge, allowing the fan to customise and connect with his/her club.
Past the Shankly statue and into my seat in the Lower Centenary. Oh what a marvellous day to be a Liverpool supporter — 4-0 and top of the league.
There’s something special in the air around Anfield, and having found a match day shirt to show off my colours with pride, without being dragged into the commercial chasm of 21st century football, I feel closer to Liverpool Football Club and history than I ever have before.
Campo Retro’s ‘The Empire Jersey Red / Old White L/S’ shirt is part of their Stadio Team Colours range and is priced at £35.00.
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