Paraguay

Away; 2011/14

A Paraguay away shirt isn’t something that often sees a lot of action on the pitch. Within South America, only Chile seem to present a serious kit clash, while a change of shorts and socks is often seen as enough to distinguish them from both Argentina and Peru. FIFA-controlled tournament finals can be different, owing to the world governing body’s strict direction on clashes. Despite their relatively rare use, it has not stopped La Albirojja been provided with some great away options.

This shirt would have been worn at Copa America 2011, but no colour clashes occurred as they advanced to the final. That run was actually a peculiar one that would give Ireland’s Italia ‘90 campaign a run for its money in terms of scraping by on the bare minimum. Despite playing six games at the Argentina-hosted finals, Paraguay only played four different teams and technically didn’t win a match or score in the knock-out section. Three draws in a group against Brazil, Venezuela and Ecuador was enough to see them qualify as the second best third-placed team out of the three groups. Even this finish was only on goal difference from Costa Rica who had also claimed three points in their group. From there, Paraguay faced Brazil again in the quarter final and after a nil-nil draw, knocked the Canaries out on penalties. Next was another meeting with Venezuela, and yet another nil-nil draw followed by shoot-out win. There was to be no heroic penalties win in the final though, as Paraguay were outclassed by a Diego Forlan inspired Uruguay side that put three past them without reply.

Despite the shirt only being worn a handful of times by the senior men’s side, mainly just when needed against Chile, it did see much more action by the futsal and women’s teams, the latter of which still used it as late as 2014. I’m glad it did get these appearances too, as I am a big fan of the shirt. Paraguay have been let down by Adidas on many occasions in my opinion, but not here. I like designs that use large iconography on the front, and it works well here. While it might at first look a bit like a rejected Captain America outfit, it is actually taking its design cues from the flag of Paraguay. The horizontal tri-colour stripes are central to the shirt, and within that the most integral part is a gold star which is taken directly from the centre of the flag (in itself, taken from the Paraguay coat of arms).

I was also lucky enough to pick this up in its player-spec version, which included Adidas’ ‘TechFit’ taping which wsa intended to grip the player’s body as a hybrid of a shirt and baselayer. Looking back on games where TechFit shirts were worn, it was an awful experiment aesthetically, but it is still nice to have an example of that technology in my collection.