Hi all, pardon the intrusion. I'm a football shirt collector with a preference for novel and interesting kits (and in Football Manager, a three time Champions League winner with Watford), and every other week I pen a needlessly long article/review about a shirt I've managed to add to the collection. If the title wasn't a dead giveaway already, I'm sure you can guess it now; I got my hands on Watford's current home strip, after having decided that I liked the look of Kelme's stuff a lot more than what adidas supplied in previous years. If you fancy a read or want a closer look at the shirt before buying one yourself (think there's one or two sizes available online still), do please have a look!; https://club25football.wordpress.com/ I've blown through almost 4000 words giving my own perspective, but I'm really curious to learn what hardcore fans of the club think about this shirt. Happy with Kelme so far or better off with a big name like adidas? Unhappy about having a betting sponsor or begrudgingly accepting it as part of modern football? Maybe next year I'll actually review my original Blaupunkt shirt (albeit sadly without the sponsor printing).
That's a good article - I enjoyed reading that. In answer to your questions, I'm happy with Kelme. I enjoy the bespoke aspects of our kit, the quirky design and the quality of them. I think Kelme suits our club on quite a few levels. I'm a massive fan of our away and third kit, more so than our home kit but that's not to put our home kit down. It's really well done. In terms of the sponsor, I'd ideally not have a big betting company plastered all over our shirt but we need the money. I doubt we'd get that much else from anyone else who isn't from the world of gambling. There's a a few leaks from our Kelme kit this year but it's hard to tell how they will look until it's released.
Without trying to sound like a condescending **** I would recommend you change your blog colours as reading amber coloured text on a purple background is difficult and I stopped reading because of that not the content which I was enjoying….. boring as it may be …. Black text on white background is the way, maybe boarder it in purple to keep your theme.
Yeah in a bizarre twist for someone who is meant to be reviewing the aesthetics of things, your own website is ghastly and completely unreadable with those colours.
As for the last Watford shirt, its boldness was befitting for a team doing well, which thankfully we did, but may have seemed a bit over-the-top had we been crap and found ourselves languishing in mid-table of the Champ.
I quite like it but would never wear it, partly because I wouldn't want to be seen with the name of a betting company on something I am wearing but mainly because I'm too conservative to wear football shirts. As has been said earlier, it is a design that requires success. Mediocrity would make it look stupid. Thank you for getting the stag (or hart) and Hertfordshire correct. I agree with the comments on your site colour scheme. I had to put on spectacles to read it comfortably, which I do not normally have to do to read on line stuff.
The irony of my site being absolutely terrible is definitely not lost on me, thank you all for bearing with it. I wasn't planning on buying the shirt due to the gambling sponsor (very much against them and crossing my fingers for a different sponsor in 2021/2022), but then my partner won this shirt in a giveaway from the Icelandic Watford fan club - I'm as surprised as you are that one exists. As someone who owns 250ish different football shirts, I will say that Kelme's material is quality. Much better than recent adidas shirts, and the sponsor being sublimated is quite rare. Or perhaps a shame in this case as you might want it to wash off.
I really loved this years design once I saw it in person. The initial leaks weren't flattering to say the least and initially I hated it. Kelme overall has been good, with sizing catching some people out where a Small was nearer a Medium, etc etc. The quality of the kit has been very, very good. It feels comfortable to wear without issues of anything coming off of it over time. Interesting comment from you that "Kelme do not fleece fance with substandard replica shirts and overly expensive player-spec ones; the shirts you buy in the store are exactly the same as those worn on the pitch by the first team, with no exceptions!" It definitely feels it. Also, minor typo. "91 oints" rather than "91 points"!
I love the shirt, but didn't buy it. I did buy some of the (more subtle) Kelme training stuff and have to say the quality is brilliant. Far better than any of the other football shirt brands I can think of.
