The Brazilian team that ended up becoming champions in 1958 had embarked on that World Cup wearing only the yellow uniform.
A few hours before the final, I learned that opponents Sweden, hosts of that World Cup, would wear the same color.
The solution found by the Brazilian delegation was to buy blue shirts in a clothing store in Stockholm. Even the doctor and masseur helped sew the numbers onto the back of the makeshift uniform.
The episode, which would be impossible in today’s ultra-professionalized and billion-dollar football world, illustrates how uniforms have evolved along with the sport.
Until the first decades of the 20th century, the oldest football federation in the world, that of England, provided its national team players with just the shirt — it was up to the athletes to bring their own shorts and socks.
This only changed in 1934, when the federation began to provide its players with full uniforms.
The number on the back became mandatory by FIFA only in the 1950 World Cup, in Brazil. The logos of sporting goods companies began to appear on shirts only at the 1974 World Cup in West Germany.
“The 1970 World Cup was the most important of all time, and there was still this almost amateurish thing: the shirt was used in a game and had to be washed afterwards”, says Cassio Brandão, who entered the 2024 Guinness Book as the largest collector of original football shirts, with 6,823 items.
The reign of 100% cotton shirts lasted a long time in football. It was only at the 1986 World Cup, in Mexico, that the Brazilian team wore a uniform made of polyester for the first time.
The great technological leap took place in the 1990s and 2000s, with the launch of mixed synthetic fabrics that facilitate the evaporation of sweat, such as Dri-Fit, from Nike, and ClimaCool, from Adidas.
“In recent years, we have followed a very accelerated path of technological, aerodynamic and lighter fabric evolution, which adapts to the body and retains less sweat”, says Brandão.
According to the collector, the World Cup has always been the biggest stage for new shirts throughout history. “Brands drive innovation to a lesser extent in clubs, but the World Cup has the power to make transformation explode.”
Even with so many advances, this year there were two failures in the sporting equipment of large companies that dress the World Cup athletes.
Puma shirts are tearing easily, while Nike shirts came with a manufacturing defect that causes swelling in the shoulder area.
Exhibition in São Paulo
A small — but very significant — part of Brandão’s collection can be seen free of charge at the Mantos Champions exhibition, on view until July 26th at the Pátio Higienópolis shopping mall, in the central region of São Paulo.
There are 11 original shirts from the Brazilian team, from 1950 to 2022, including one worn by Pelé in 1971, and seven more from countries, such as Germany, Argentina and France.
