New season, new coach, new players. Unfortunately, the one major hangover we're stuck with from the last disastrous season is that appalling kit. It's time for Hornets fans to stand up (quick before the stewards thrash you back into your seat with a pool ball in a sock) and show our true colours.It's traditional. Teams turn up at Spotland wearing a shirt that looks like it's been designed by Stevie Wonder and we take the pi** out of them. But once again this season, we'll be denied that pleasure because - for the second season in succession - Hornets will be lining up in what can only be described as an abomination in Polyester.
In marketing, they talk a lot about branding. Your brand is the public face of your organisation. It encapsulates all of the things which determine the way people 'feel' about your company. It is an expression of its culture, its commitment and its values. The same goes for your club colours. Strong, dynamic colours convey strength and energy. Traditional styles show stability and durability. Crap shirts... well, they just make you look crap.
Now Hornets hoops may not have been the snazziest of shirts, but it represented steadfastness and continuity. Our current shirt is a characterless, featureless and quite frankly artless effort that could be seen running around any park pitch in the country. It doesn't somehow look like the sort of shirt you'll see running around in the Grand Final. As for the protestations that it's made up of our 'traditional' colours, there's too much white, not enough blue and the red's as insipid as red can get without being pink. And the away shirt? Admittedly, tangerine and black sounded interesting. I pictured an intimidating black jersey shot through with vibrant flashes of orange. What do we get? The cast off kit that Ellgren obviously couldn't foist on Castleford.
At least our previous black and green away kit looked mean and tasteful.
Home or away, the crass and anonymous excuse for a jersey doesn't look or feel like a Hornets shirt. It's badly designed, cheap looking and quite simply not good enough.
The only consolation is that it hasn't gone the whole moronic hog with the word HORNETS emblazoned across the back (assistance for idiots who're not sure which is their team, Oldham fans) or a bad cartoon of a hornet on it (cheap merchandise posing as kit a la Keighley).
I don't know who was responsible for commissioning this aberration, but they should hang their heads in shame. Whether you buy one or not is up to you, but I'd still rather be caught having it off with Vanessa Feltz whilst wearing an Oldham shirt than waste £40 on one.
So, right here, right now, TLCRF80mins launches our ultimately fruitless - but some fun to be had - campaign for the return to hoopy shirts. We're no longer prepared to put up with that wishy-washy, crap design, sad excuse for a jersey that our team has to run around in. We want red, white and blue hoops - in any combination - just like we had in the glory days of...er.. well, the glory days. The 1973 John Player Trophy final, the Floodlit Trophy Final, 1990's promotion to the top flight, The 1991 John Player semi, the Lancashire Cup final - all achieved wearing HOOPS! It's obvious. Good Hornets sides wear hoopy shirts - not nasty cheapo efforts that bear no relationships to most supporters Hornets-watching experience. And hoopy shirts make Hornets sides better. Don't argue, they just do.
So, please feel free to bombard us with letters demanding a return to hoops - we'll pass on your mesages. I'm sure we'll have a petition up and running at some point in the season. Write to the Observer. Generally stir up a bit of pride in our traditions and let's see if we can reinstate the shirt we all take so much pride in. Back to hoops - NOW!