Swansea City: Kitted Out

IT'S almost time for one of the summer's best moments - the launch of the new Swansea City kit! What will we be wearing next season? Who will we be wearing next season? In this blog post JULES PRICE takes a look at rumours surrounding the new kit and sponsor.


Now that the dust has began to settle on another successful season in the Premier League, attention now turns to the behind-the-scenes work at Swansea City.

While much has been and will be written about the potential new signings, players leaving and the ongoing saga of the relationship between Michael Laudrup and the Board of Directors, I’m equally intrigued by the design of the 2013/14 shirts and club sponsor.

The Swans and current shirt sponsor 32Red came to an amicable agreement to terminate the arrangement early. No doubt the Swans would have compensated the online gambling company, but they (32Red) surely had the agreement of the century!

Just consider the amount the company had paid to the Swans while the club was in the Championship, but of course had since been given global coverage on an unseen level at the Liberty Stadium. Thus, the Swans sought a new partnership that would reflect the level of exposure the club could promise any new suitor as they enter the Europa League

Rumours have circulated it could be Infiniti who are currently a club partner, while the Swansea City Wikipedia page states Nexon as the new sponsor. But Leigh Dineen confirmed to me that the new sponsor isn't a current club partner.

I have heard rumours of Samsung and Black & Decker. The latter seems a little strange to me. The Korean company Samsung would be a potential fit as Swansea’s midfielder Ki Sung-Yueng is worshipped in the country, but they already sponsor Chelsea. What about LG? They previously sponsored Fulham and are always looking to ‘troll’ Samsung.

It does seem the Swans were hoping to tie the shirt sponsor into a stadium naming rights exercise at the same time. This will not be the case. Not for the foreseeable future anyway. The extra naming rights fund would have been used to finance some of the stadium expansion that should have started this month with the creation of a fourth tier in the West Stand. This is not going ahead and the better use of spare communal space in the West Stand will house the media.

Of course, the club shop is being expanded into a ‘superstore’ that will accommodate a record-breaking amount of stock. 55,000 shirts will be available this year. A staggering amount! The lead-time for the club to order the shirt design is nine months from Adidas, and thus they are currently being printed with the new sponsor’s name at the time of writing this article. I believe the shirts should be available during the first two weeks of July.

Finally, I have heard rumours of the Swans considering a second superstore in Cwmdu industrial estate. I haven’t been able to substantiate this, so if you have heard this rumour too I would love to hear from you.