“First and foremost, the easiest way for a kit to become iconic is if the team was successful in it,” podcast host and football historian Peter Kenny Jones tells BBC Sport.
England were famously beaten by West Germany on penalties in the semi-final of the 1990 World Cup in Italy but, after decades of underperforming at major tournaments, Bobby Robson’s team showcased the skill, determination and strength of character that fans had been calling out for.
“Although England didn’t win that tournament, they came home to an open-top bus parade and the whole country gathered around them,” Jones added.
“Paul Gascoigne become a national hero. Iconic moments like him crying and Gary Lineker asking the bench to have a word.”
Not only was there an increase in sales of England shirts during and after Italia ’90, the jersey remains a fan favourite to this day.
However, it wasn’t only the Three Lions jersey from that tournament that caught the imagination.
Football fans Doug Bierton and Matthew Dale, who met while studying at university, have turned the sale of retro football shirts into a near-£40m business empire.
The kit that started it all? The West Germany home shirt worn at that World Cup. “I think it cost £20 in a charity shop in the student area of Manchester. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw it,” Bierton says.
Italia ’90 was the first major football tournament Bierton watched on TV and it was the initial difficulty in tracking down this specific shirt, worn by the likes of Rudi Voller and Lothar Matthaus, which led him to assume other fans had similar problems when searching for an old jersey.
The idea for Classic Football Shirts was born. The company began from a spare bedroom and the first few shirts were bought using Bierton and Dale’s student loans.
“My goal was to collect every kit from Italia ’90,” he said. “But the problem is, they only made half of them that you could buy in the shop. So you’ve got to dig around, contacting ex-players, going down wormholes to find them. I’ve ticked off most, but I’m missing four.
“So I need Cameroon 1990 away, United Arab Emirates home, Uruguay home, South Korea home. Then I’ve got the full set.”
Bierton has a personal collection of about 6,700 match-worn shirts, while his company’s warehouse is home to a million football shirts.
