Five shirts to tell the story of the partnership between Germany and adidas

It is not known when the relationship between adidas and the German National team officially began. In fact, it goes back to a time when the kit manufacturer's logo was not yet visible on the jersey and the agreements were often hidden from the fans and players. The first jerseys produced by adidas for the national team date back to the early post-war period, when the nation was still divided into East and West. And it was West Germany that won the 1954 World Cup by beating the favored Golden Team of Hungary in the final, which is still remembered today as the Miracle of Bern. On this occasion, Adi Dassler, who had just re-founded his company after parting ways with his brother Rudolf and the end of National Socialism in Germany, produced revolutionary football boots that enabled the German footballers to withstand the fury of the Hungarians in the pouring rain. A decade later, however, adidas designed a piece that would go down in football history, at least if you consider its stylistic impact, namely the tracksuit with the Three Stripes on the sleeves and shoulders for the Kaiser, Franz Beckenbauer, when he played for the national team of which he was captain.

But it wasn't until the 1980s that adidas became a full-fledged technical sponsor of the German national team, first with the Trefoil and later with the Three Stripes on the right side of the chest, a partnership that has spanned all eras of international football. And now, with the news of the German federation's switch to Nike causing a wave of consternation and surprise, we attempt to recount those fifty years of football and style through the kits that helped write them.

1988 - Home Jersey

The 1980s defined adidas as the most important sports brand in the world, even a global lifestyle phenomenon in hip-hop and disco music, but few images are more iconic than the German national team on the pitch at their home European Championships in 1988. The West German host nation didn't win, the title went to Marco Van Basten and the Netherlands, but they won everyone over with the revolutionary design of their players' jersey. A bow with the three colors of the flag running horizontally across the jersey and creating a graphic play across the shoulders - a template that was adopted by many other teams in the years that followed. But it was West Germany themselves who would immortalize adidas' work by winning the 1990 World Cup at the Stadio Olimpico two years later - on a magical night for the German brand.

1994 - Home Jersey

Another World Cup, another iconic template for the German national team, this time in one piece, for the 1994 World Cup in the USA. At the time, adidas did not name its templates, so the names used to differentiate the various designs are not official, but best describe the concept behind the jersey. The Diamond Template, as it was later called, represents the pinnacle of adidas' creativity in the 1990s, when printed graphics made football jerseys three-dimensional. The white base color of the German national team was topped by a kind of three-row collar of embedded diamonds in the colors of the flag. This design was so beautiful that it was later used by so many teams, both club and national.

2006 - Home Jersey

We come to a new home World Cup for perhaps the most famous adidas template of this millennium - it is no coincidence that it was the inspiration for this season's new adidas jerseys - and which has found its perfect application in the German national team's jersey. We are of course talking about Teamgeist, the design originally seen on the seams of a ball and later reproduced on the pitch on the adidas-sponsored jerseys of the national team. The version for the German national team, worn by Michael Ballack and Miro Klose, was white with red and yellow side inserts, while black defined the shoulder and neck area.

2014 - Away Jersey

But this other jersey, worn during the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, and in particular in one of the most surreal matches ever seen in a final phase, the German national team's 7-1 victory over the verdeoro hosts in front of a stunned Mineirão crowd in Belo Horizonte, is another story. Joachim Löw's team lined up in an away jersey that featured red and black horizontal stripes - an unusual design for a team that usually wears green away shirts. In addition, the decision to use black shorts was well received by the national team's fans and formed a perfect one-off with the match kit, which mockingly resembled that of one of Brazil's most famous clubs, Flamengo.

2022 - Home Jersey

The last decade of the relationship between adidas and the German FA will not be complete, as the jerseys for the 2026 World Cup will be the last to be produced by the Three Stripes. That's why we've chosen the home jersey from the last World Cup, which took place in Qatar and where Germany surprisingly didn't make it past the preliminary round. A jersey that perfectly underlines how the sensibility for jersey design has changed over the years. It started in the early 1970s with a very clean look, partly due to the scarcity of technical possibilities, went through two decades of extreme graphic experimentation and the tyranny of stencils, before finally returning to a return to minimalism. The Germany jersey is crossed by a single central black band on which the sponsor and association crests are placed vertically, while the other colors of the flag can only be seen at the edge of the neck. A choice dictated by a general trend rather than a technical limitation. Another piece in the long history of the development of football shirts, told year after year by the relationship between adidas and the German national team.