Newcastle Toon Castore Shirt

This is one of the best Toon shirts in my opinion, very like the classic Umbro shirt in the 80s.  I thought Castore did a great job and put out some decent designs for the Toon. 

I wanted to see what quality issue the shirt may have if any as everyone has heard of Castore making shirts that fall apart or don't evaporate sweat accordingly. 

This is the standard fan version with a sponsorless design which I prefer so no plasticy transfer gets washed away after wearing and the crest and brand logo is also embroidered so can last the washes. 

Full marks for the collar and the cuffs, it feels like a classic. 

Overall, I like this shirt. I would say the material is very ordinary and not something I particularly want to write about, doesn't feel the best but it is OK. I just really like the classic design and at least I can own a Castore shirt in my collection.  The shirt is also quite big in size or at least this fan version is with quite wide width and shoulder, sleeve cut in comparison to some other shirts that I have.

Senegal World Cup 2022 Away

This is the Senegal sway shirt that was released for the World cup back in 2022.  There are quite a few of these on sale at a cheap price.  Even though I am not a great fan of this Puma design, I thought I will get hold of one as at least I thought this was probably one of the more acceptable takes on this poor template.  It surely can win the worst template of recent times and it is a big drop for Puma comparing it with some of the great Afcon shirts that they have had.

This whole square in the middle is just I don't know.  All transferred onto the shirt so you can see how long it will last before it all peels off.  The one design that I think is good is the shirt's colour and the collar's colours.

The quality of the crest's transfer is probably good so let's see how long will it last.

The collar in more details, always nice colours.

If the sleeves could have had the same cuffs like the collar's colours, it would have made the shirt a bit better.

Overall, because of the shirt's colour and collar, it saves this shirt from being total trash.  If you can make it fit quite well, it's bearable to wear as the design gives it some cheesy razzmatazz feel about it if that is what you want.  The material feels OK somewhat better than the Morocco away shirt which should have been of similar material being from the same mother template, it feels like this one has more breathable light material than the other.  The shirts are made in different countries so different factory, this one being Vietnam while Morocco one was made in Indonesia. 

Morocco World Cup 2022 Home

Right seeing this in a sale tempted me to get it.  I am some what surprised that you can still find this in the right size on sale considering it must be seen as a special shirt for Morocco having achieved a historic feat wearing it. After all it is also a design that I kind of quite like about Morocco based on their 1998 shirt that I have vivid memories of and somewhat a distinctive design.  It certainly reminds of it and after the legendary achievements of the Moroccan team wearing it in 2022, it would be a sample to cherish before it goes out of circulation.  It will probably become another classic retro in years to come.

Very simple shirt with the band on the chest.  Some people have said the Puma logo spoils it but it would look more weird in my opinion if it were to be on the right hand side of the green band instead.  I think the red and green contrast somewhat gives the design a distinct look.  The collar is also good colour being matching green. Just a quite badass looking design to it. 

The crest is embroidered so safe to wash.

The sleeve's cuff also cool.  The material in these shirts are OK not brilliant and not the best Puma have had, a bit thick and feels a bit heavy not in my liking. 

No surprises from the back and very nice shirt in a way, probably the best in Puma's current African collection.

 

Morocco World Cup 2022 Away

This was on sale and a pick up for the World Cup 2022 Morocco away shirt.  I think it was worn in the group stages before they went onto the semis where they worn their legendary home red with green patch shirt.  That I think is really cool and I wouldn't mind picking one of those up before they go out of circulation.

Well this one is OK with Puma's latest design and build.  They are transferring their crest and logo onto the shirt and there will be a question of longevity on these as I can imagine after 100 washes, they will peel off, lets wait and see.  I think the Morocco and Egypt home shirt is one of the few in their African series that still uses embroidery instead of transfer, I have seen the other shirts like Senegal, Ghana that all have this ridiculous transfer and hideous designs.  This Morocco shirt IMO is one of the better designs in a bad bunch.  But still they could have done better.  For the African teams Puma have gone downhill ever since the 2010s and 15s. 

Crest itself is cool.  See the transfer technique.

The design is OK, but Puma really screwed it with sticking the country's abbreviation onto it, its unnecessary and cheeses it.

 The cuff itself is nice and one of the better touches in this series, I think had they done this for the Senegal, Ghana away shirts, it would have been better too.

Material itself is decent, although feels a bit thick and sticky after wearing a bit and the shirt itself has an OK shape to it.  Not particularly slim athletic fit anymore but I think that is out of fashion and the loose fit is now back.

Not too many surprises from the bad, overall an OK shirt.  May be one for the cupboard's collection to see if it becomes a classic in the future.

Mali Airness again

Airness again and another non fake Mali shirt.  By now you can tell Mali just has a nice theme with their colours and the flying eagle.

The Airness embroidered logo.  Notice the swiggle in the front of the cat?  I think that is a trademark.  But I see even the fake ones have it. ;-)

Now this what I wanted for my new shirt that I am hoping to wear, it has an embroidered crest so it should survive more washes and not fall off as quickly.  I now own enough shirts to conclude anything non embroidered all end up just falling off or peel off after a period of regular wash and wear.  The down side to this one is that the embroidered crest is just stitched on around the parameter and not fully embroidered onto the material, so there is a chance the threads can break over time and it will fall off, but if it happens, it should be able to be stitched back on by a tailor.

Nice cuff design, and this shirt is relatively slim fit too although it looks big, it is not huge around the shoulder, this was an M and I can still almost wear it in good shape when I am usually a S.

The claws of the eagle, condor..

 

Zoom in on the eagle, nice.

The back is just nice too, simple with no surprises. 

Overall, I am happy to get hold of this and start wearing it, the last one was good, so good that I wore it too often and the crest began to fall of, resorting to super glue to get it back on after a wash.  Now that one can be consign to the cupboard for collection and I can start wearing this.  The material used by Airness on these shirts is top and very nice to wear thin material.  Love it.

 

Botswana Umbro Home shirt

This is another cheap pick up from m and m direct for an Umbro Botswana shirt.  I previously tried one from global jerseys and it was likely to be a fake and the sizing seemed to have been extra large even though it was supposedly a medium.  This is suppose to be a genuine replica from Umbro sold as end of stock cheap be a reputable online retailer.  Lets see is it any good.  The shirt itself looked really good in the stock pictures, it horse / zebra silhouette looked really good.  The dancing zebra.  However, I felt in real life the shirt is not quite as good.

The crest is nice and I like the zebra.

Here is where I think there was a fault with the shirt, the label's embroidery seemed to be a bit warped and mangled and you can see the squeeze.

The sleeves is also a little bit out

Nice flag of Botswana here.

From the back it shows the Zebras and pretty standard fair.

This was not a bad pick, material wise it is OK.  The fit itself seems OK too.

 

Sierra Leone Umbro Away shirt

This was another nice interesting bargain, it is supposed to be an Away or third shirt of Sierra Leone and it is made by Umbro.  I think you have to appreciate brands like Umbro do at least make a bit more effort for teams and national teams that aren't exactly the most well know while the likes of Nike, Adidas likes to resort to forcing these teams to have just a template shirt. 

At least Umbro made a nice pattern to show the vibrancy of an African nation.  Its a pretty cool graphic when seen from an angle, kind of trippy in a way too.

Good old crest, nicely embroidered together with the Umbro logo so no risk of it falling off easily after a thousand washes.

The sleeve is pretty standard, could have been a bit narrower to give that nice snug more athletic fit or added a bit of a trim design to make it cooler.

See what I meant about the pattern being quite trippy

Plain green from the back.  No surprises.  Overall a decent shirt and material is good to wear as coming from Umbro.