SUSO

THE YEAR IT ALL CHANGED

Hackney Marshes hits the big time. 

I’m going to take you back. Back to a time when Brit pop ruled the airwaves, to a time of New Labour, national mourning, cloned sheep and mad cows. I’m talking 1997. That year, Man Utd had won the premier league with a 7 point cushion, the memory of the season before was still fresh, Stan Collymore denying Newcastle the title leaving Kevin Keegan slumped over the ad hoardings at Anfield. It was pure theatre.

Football was bigger and better than ever before, Sky were taking terrestrial stations to the cleaners, transfer fees were going through the roof, it didn’t take a genius to realise the beautiful game had become very big business indeed... Enter Nike.

There was a time when the idea of Nike making football gear was laughable. The gloriously unglamorous Hummel chevrons adorned the kits of some of the nation’s top teams, as did Patrick, Le Coq Sportif, Errea, Admiral - what a mess this must have looked like to the guardians of the Swoosh. It was time to strike. Is it a shame that we no longer see these independent kit manufacturers? Of course it is. Then again, without Nike’s arrival on the scene we would never have been given this, the best football ad ever made:

Categories Sport Tags Nike Football

By on 24/10/08