With Newcastle kit suppliers Castore launching their Rangers' 2021/22 away kit today, the brand's attention can now turn to the away kit launches of Newcastle and Wolves.
Consensus is that Castore will launch Wolves' away kit next, possibly even at the weekend. There's an acknowledged degree of flexibility when it comes to what kit is worn during pre-season, but the Midlands club have a friendly with Las Palmas on Monday at a neutral venue in Marbella.
Given that Las Palmas play in bright yellow, one team will have to wear a change kit, so there's a possibility this will be the first outing for Wolves' Castore away.
Rangers' Castore away kit launch meanwhile offered some clues as to what Newcastle fans can expect. A big play was made by the brand on Glasgow's local heritage influencing the colour choices. Red and black have famously featured on the club's home socks since the early 1900s and are two colours synonymous with the burgh of Govan where Rangers' made their home 150 years ago.
The collar design on the Rangers' shirt gathered a mixed response from fans on social media, but with Castore confirming they won't be working to templates, we can rule out the same style featuring on Newcastle's design.
There's plenty of local heritage to draw inspiration from in Newcastle and the surrounding area. The green of the Tyne Bridge for example featured on the Asics third kit Newcastle wore fleetingly in the early 90s, a shirt that is still championed to this day and worn by fans. Perhaps a nod to that shirt will come when Castore launch Newcastle's third kit, rather than the away.
The orange element on the Newcastle coaching staff's training wear is another big clue. We saw the synergy between the thick stripe down the middle of the players' blue short-sleeve training tee and the thick black stripes that subsequently appeared on the home shirt, so don't be surprised if that burnt orange features on the away shirt too.
Rangers' training kit is predominately red-and-black this season, so we know Castore aren't adverse to linking from training wear to match day wear.
The home shirt was a clear nod towards the 1995-97 Adidas kit, and Castore could pay tribute to the equally iconic maroon and navy hooped away shirt of that era too. However, given that Puma played that card as recently as 2018/19, Castore might feel that is too predictable and steer clear.
Castore meanwhile remained tight-lipped on an official launch date when ChronicleLive approached them today, saying it wasn't something they wanted to share.
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