New Balance’s appeal to the High Court over the verdict on the kit deal has been rejected, and Nike will now start manufacturing Liverpool’s kits next season.
And now a new question looms over the situation for fans – what are the manufacturing giants going to do for the Reds.
As per the Liverpool Echo, supporters now know that the Reds will be getting less money from the Nike deal than they would one from New Balance – so what’s the benefits?
Well, this unique aspect of details being made public is a rarity and that alone has sports marketing expert Tim Crow believing that Nike will have to do something special and equally original.
“I think it will be interesting how Nike use them because there will be a lot of interest in how those players are used,” he told the Liverpool Echo.
“I think this [court case] has given [kit deals] more interest and publicity than they would normally would get. There will be a lot of focus on this and for Liverpool fans, there will be a great deal of expectation. Looking at social media and whatnot, Nike have got to come up with something special here.
“Not just in terms of the kit, where what I sense is Liverpool fans want something very individual so they don’t look like just any other team manufactured by Nike, they also want them to do something special with the club’s heritage and all that sort of stuff.
“But you know, I think now people know that Liverpool are getting less money from Nike than they would from New Balance, there’s a lot of expectation from Liverpool fans I think.”
Speaking as a fan myself, there definitely is a concern from Liverpool fans that we’re going to get some kind of cookie cutter of a kit next season.
It’s not a swipe at Nike, but in previous years they have seemingly tweaked with a template for many top clubs around Europe – Inter and Spurs spring to mind.
But this year they have put out some really nice looking kits – so Reds fans can be hopeful that the new kit makers are going to give us something unique and stylish.