Enigma Variations: Coventry Wearing England Shirts
The trouble with YouTube is that, like so many other online platforms these days, it seems to know more about you than feels comfortable. That, and the incessant flood of adverts we have to endure in order to make other people richer than Croesus.
Let’s not get into the latter point right now. YouTube easily remembers which videos you’ve been watching and suggests similar videos for you to consider next time. At times, it can feel like a curse, as if YouTube believes you only live your life being interested in one thing. At other times, however, it can be a blessing, such as when YouTube recently remembered I was a West Ham fan and randomly recommended a video by Robert Banks.
Robert, I discovered, has been busy creating a huge number of videos that chronicle the history of The Hammers from month to month, year to year from the mid-1970s onwards. Each one is packed with photos, TV footage, news headlines and popular culture references that really give you a sense of what it was like to be a West Ham fan in days gone by. (Spoiler alert: grim, most of the time.)
Having seen a similarly enjoyable series based on Leeds United’s recent history a couple of years ago, I decided to dive in at the start with a look at ‘The John Lyall Years’ to find out what West Ham were up to between 1974 and 1989. While watching one such video focusing on the latter part of the 1977-78 season, I was somewhat taken aback by a caption referring to the visit of Coventry City to Upton Park on April 1st 1978 that said:
“A wardrobe malfunction means the Coventry kit man has to go shopping for 11 England shirts.”
Immediately my mind recalled the fabled tale of Argentina’s kit man hastily buying some blue shirts for Carlos Bilardo’s team ahead of the 1986 World Cup quarter final against England. This seemed even more fantastical, to my mind. Why England shirts, specifically, and what was so wrong with Coventry’s away kit?
To save you any unnecessary disappointment at the end of this article, I should tell you that I have no official answer to the first question. My guess is that the England shirts were white, therefore providing sufficient contrast with the claret and blue shirts of West Ham.
Having looked at the grainy photos from the match-day programme featured on Robert Banks’ YouTube video, those England shirts didn’t have any badge on them, so that must have made them especially appealing to Coventry’s kit man. Yet the latter question remains pertinent: why didn’t they have a suitable change kit?
Coventry’s home kit was out of the question as its sky blue colouring would have clashed with West Ham’s home shirts. That left any one of three alternatives, predominantly coloured brown, red or yellow. The brown kit wouldn’t have provided much contrast with the similarly dark West Ham shirts (especially on a dark April night), and red might have been viewed as being close to the home team’s claret too. Certainly when the likes of Liverpool or Manchester United paid a visit to Upton Park, they almost always swapped their red home shirts for a light-coloured alternative. That just leaves Coventry’s yellow kit, but perhaps they thought they wouldn’t need it on this occasion?
Judging by the black-and-white photos on the video, Coventry must have brought the shorts and socks from either their red Admiral tramlines away kit, or the brown equivalent. Quite honestly, it’s not that easy to tell.
To give an idea of how the kit might have looked, I’ve created this graphic (see right). As you can see, neither of the two alternatives looks especially good, although at least the one with red shorts picks up the red from the England shirt. Without the tramlines on the shirt, it just doesn’t work as a coherent whole, not least because the blue stripe on the sleeves doesn’t relate to any other part of the kit. Full marks to the kit man, however, for having the presence of mind to buy Admiral shirts so that they tallied up with the shorts and socks.
So in summary, how can we sum up this fashion faux-pas? Well we can say without doubt that none of this retrospective analysis would have taken place if Coventry City hadn’t just brought their yellow change kit. That would have resolved the issue at a stroke. Let’s also acknowledge that City had FOUR colour options to choose from at a time when most clubs had, at best three, and often only two. Finally, who cares? There can’t be many people that don’t love to see a hastily cobbled together change kit, and only two months later, France would go on to wear the weirdest one of all during the 1978 World Cup. Coventry City in green and white striped change shirts... now that would be a sight to see.
