The Central Coast Mariners will sport a fresh look for the Hyundai A-League 2017/18 season after unveiling their new playing strips on Friday night.
On Friday evening at the Sunken Monkey Hotel, the full Mariners playing squad surprised a venue packed with Mariners Members and revealed a range of fresh new kits for the upcoming season.
The home kit features a traditional football top with a button up collar and classic, vertical yellow & navy stripes. Partnered with the collared top are navy board shorts and navy socks, a significant design shift from the predominantly yellow home kits of the recent past.
To embrace the surf culture of the Central Coast, the Mariners have worked with Umbro to incorporate longer style, navy shorts that will be worn with the home kit. The home-shorts also double as board shorts and can be worn in the ocean during the Central Coast summer.
For the away kit, it’s a return of the navy sash which runs diagonally across a predominantly yellow jersey that will be worn on the road this season. The away top does not feature a collar and will be partnered with yellow shorts and yellow socks.
Between the two very different and distinct playing kits, there truly is an option for everyone heading into the Hyundai A-League 2017/18 season.
Central Coast Mariners CEO Shaun Mielekamp spoke about the club’s fresh mentality to earn their stripes and what it means both on the pitch and in the street.
“It is time to earn our stripes,” Mielekamp said. “Earning our stripes means much more than just wearing this season’s jersey.
“As a football club, we are heading into a new chapter in our proud history. A chapter that, if executed correctly, will see the Yellow & Navy restored with pride and the badge worn proudly by Mariners both on the Coast and beyond.
“It is also the time we call on the thousands of members and fans to unite in showing their support for the team, wearing our stripes, representing our community and making us proud. Proud to be a Mariner. This will help show that we are still the community club and that when anyone travels to Central Coast Stadium they are guaranteed a great time in the stands and a tough time on the pitch,” Mielekamp said.
Mielekamp also spoke about the motivation behind the club’s bold design shift and new distinct features.
“The challenge was set from the owner to have a kit that not only aids high performance on the pitch but also looks great whether you’re in the stands on the street or even at the beach.
“This kit is a result of more than 18 months of design work that involved the very best global designers from Umbro in the UK personally meeting with Mike Charlesworth.
“Apart from all of the obvious design features, the home strip even includes extra length shorts that believe or not are designed to be capable to surf in – yes that’s right, boardies.
“It was an amazing challenge coming up with a playing strip that fulfilled such a unique brief.
“We were inspired by a lightbulb moment thanks to a sitcom called Ripping Yarns that was mentioned by Mike Charlesworth. He had no knowledge that we have a local team called Barnstoneworth here in the Central Coast as he was trying to describe a comic scene about football shorts. We then we saw the scene that famously quotes “shorts don’t matter in football, the only thing that matters is what’s inside them.”
“We stumbled across a classic football design we all loved and when converted to Yellow and Navy not only did we have a great design, but one that allowed us to have a performance short which worked as a board short also. Crazy story I know, but look at what has come from it, possibly the best kit in the history of the club,” Mielekamp said.
