“Difficult colour, green.”

Now, we’ll have to give it to the smellies - their’s is almost certainly the most famous green strip in European club football … probably because, as Dame Maggie Smith’s Countess Constance Trentham famously bitches in Gosford Park, it’s such a minging colour. No-one else really wants to have green as their home kit - and not many more want it as an away strip. So Sellik are kinda most famously green by default. Basically the hairy hoops are the only team to win the biggest prize in club football while wearing the same hue as the grass the game was played on.

But, in an effort to alleviate the pressure we’re all feeling with the rapid approach of Zero Hour in Belgrade AS WELL AS FULLY QUALIFYING the extensive remarks I made on Saturday about the new Gers Third strip (see previous rant on the homepage), I would seek to offer a reassurance: Just because I’m none too partial to Celtic, nor the colour green, I would hate to think anyone believes I’m a colour bigot. I can asssure you, I have nothing personal or sinister against the fourth shade of the rainbow.

Just because green happens to be the colour of envy, of lizards, of kryptonite, the colour used to describe the physically sick’s pallor, the hopelessly naive and the tree-hugging eco warrior twat, I fully understand there’s no logical reason why I should find this minty, composty shade any less alluring than, for example, blue - the colour of the open sea, the beautiful summer sky, the most soulful form of rythm music, the tastiest kind of joke, the most exciting genre of movie and the keystone of the lapislazuli used to decorate the garmnents of the virgin Mary in medieval and renaissance depictions of the nativity because it was the MOST EXPENSIVE, GLAMOROUS and PYOOR QUALITY paint one could concoct on one’s pallet and was therefore the only colour truly worthy of Our Lady.

No. No reason why I should prefer blue to green. None at all.

Okay - okay - I admit to having a bit of a boak over the new Rangers Third Strip - because it happens to have an ALMOST Dark Green tinge to its manic combo of Grey, Black and piped blue - but I feel my comments in Saturday’s match retort (See http://www.fateck.co.uk/index.php/2007/08/25/belgrade-on-our-minds-crap-strip-on-our-backs-three-points-in-the-bag-killie-1-gers-2/) may have led to some liberal-minded football fans thinking I HATE GREEN.

Not at all.

Yes, I have only ever worn one item of green clothing since I was old enough to buy my own gear - and that particular Harrington had a massive Union Jack on the back, an RAF target on the left tit and so much general Mod paraphernalia stuck elsewhere that no-one could ever have thought I was a BLOODY CELTIC FAN … YEEEAGGHHH … GADZZZZ! … but - aherm - yes - no - … erm … one shouldn’t read too much into this. It wasn’t a conscious choice - I just HAPPENED to avoid purhcasing green garnents. Or furniture. Or Salads.

No. This entirely COINCIDENTAL life-long aesthetic statement of mine needn’t be regarded as a political or pseudo-religious aversion. No, no, no. In fact, much like imagining what kind of woman I’d like to try to do it with if Gunter and I ever got really drunk and decided to have a bi threesome, I’ve often counterintuitively toyed with the idea of just what green football strips I would actually consider wearing. And, whaddayaknow, I’ve come up with quite a few.

In fact, I’ve gone as far as to compose a list. I won’t say these selections are my “top ten” because that implies there’s another twenty or so mainly-green football strips I find less than sickening. There isn’t. This is it.

I’ve employed our friends at You Tube to help you get the full flavour of the garments in question. because, you see, I ain’t just lazily picking a club or a country who’ve always worn green - I’m picking ONE PARTICULAR EDITION of their green strip or , in the case of one particular team, several editions of their green strip which have caught my eye. And often it’s down to how this strip looked in one particular, memorable game or campaign. The footage I’ve picked should generally be from that particular campaign. SO just because I liked the Hibs strip in which they defeated Celtic in the 1985/86 League Cup quarter-final - don’t think I still liked it when they beat Rangers in the semi-final a few weeks later!!! OKAY!!!

There will be no simple listing of the teams’strips in question. Oh no. You have to click on the clip to get the answer to my clues. I know some of you look this sh*t up at work and will probably be barred from accessing YouTube but - tough! - if ye want to get involved in my murky Green Underappreciation Fundamentalism Foundation (or GUFF for short) you’ll have to be driven underground like the rest of us.

(1) http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Iutfn37mSlI

Not the clearest picture - but the best commentary on this, the team in question’s most famous result. Red socks and the script on the shirts definitely makes it so much more appealing.

(2) http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=lm8tfI5GB4Q

Probably my all-time fav green strip. The Adidas stripes and the pin stripes - the KHR grabbing two of the most beautifully German goals ever scored - the whole game - even the fact both team’s goalscorers played in the Bundesliga at the time. And there’s something about this stadium which brings out the best in this strip.

(3) http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-bGO51_mnI

This is a lengthy video - but worth bearing with - not just for the fact ye see Rangers getting tanked at one point, aherm, but especially for the fact of the first goal against Dynamo Kiev who were 2-0 up from the first leg and about to make it 3-0 when a last-ditch tackle came in and the breakaway led to the comeback of comebacks. This strip was best when they wore the Black shorts with it and, although the present edition is a very smart Adidas number it lacks one vital ingredient: This club are not just famous for wearing le Coq Sportif but also for having a subtle but essential Red, White and Blue collar!

(4) http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=n_QRB1xyTiI&mode=related&search

The shiniest ever example of this edition of this, the only green strip I’d almost always committ myself to liking. Why have this team changed their away kit to red???!! This is a great performance by the team who usually comes out a distant second in this clash when it happens at this stadium. And if you fast forward to the 8-minute mark on the footage you get to see the greatest defender of all-time making a complete cnut of himself at the feet of one of the most overrated strikers of all time (also, for those of you who’re interested, one of the three games in which Erwin Kostedde was capped!!!).

(5) http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=FpD5SlNs2Ac

NOT this team’s most famous victory - although the green and white CHANGE combo they wore for that 1982 win in Valencia was pretty darned smart too. This particular team has, of course, the one green strip which has always been perfectly palatable to the Ibrox hordes. This latest incarnation has the lustre of great victories attached to it again … and a nice little bit of Blue trimming just to keep it real. Hope this presentation shows there’s nothing overly political in my selection - just look at who they’re beating!

(6) http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=kOOTVZsojRc

Second outing of this edition of this strip in this particular tournament. Less glossy than later versions in the same cut, shown elsewhere in this list, but looks more dramatic in the floodlit rain. Hope ye ike the foreplay involved in the presentation of this strip in this video (Check out part 2 of this clip if ye want to se the goals, BTW).

(7) http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=KQdfWP9c2U8

Not a political choice - despite the old guy in the bunnet who thinks he can get in on the act by pinching the cup and wearing the shirt with his troosers on. This is one seriously hard team, pulling off one seriously momentous victory against the odds. This is one shade of green which never looks anything other than up for a scrap - my kind of team.

Next week - “He’s an Urban legend” - my top twenty Popes.

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Published:
08.27.07 / 8pm
Category:
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