Adidas designer Mateo Kossmann says kit creation begins years before a tournament and often overlaps with future projects, according to ESPN. Kossmann, the Director of Federations at Adidas Football, spoke from Germany about work on recently launched World Cup jerseys that started three years earlier and about teams already planning kits for 2028 and beyond.
At Adidas headquarters in Herzogenaurach, Kossmann described rooms where designers discuss an Arsenal range for 2028, another room focused on technology for the 2030 World Cup, and a group studying a 1994 Germany jersey slated for re-release, ESPN reported. He said the process is lengthy and that the first box of sample home and away kits arriving in the office is the highlight of the job.
Jerseys have moved beyond mere team apparel to cultural signifiers, a point highlighted in Depop’s 2026 Trend Report and relayed to ESPN. A Depop representative told ESPN that searches for World Cup jerseys surged 652 percent in the five weeks before the report and that sales rose 26 percent week over week, evidence of growing interest in sportswear as a fashion statement and a marker of belonging.
Author and journalist Joey D’Urso, writing in his book More Than A Shirt and speaking to ESPN, linked jerseys to memory and national identity. He said shirts acquire extra meaning when teams win in them, noting replicas of 2022 champions Argentina were widely visible on a recent trip to that country. D’Urso also cited the spike in replica demand after major victories, pointing to long lines outside the Arsenal club shop after the club’s Premier League title as an example of success driving sales.
D’Urso argued that effective World Cup shirts balance creativity with restraint, calling for bold, clear design rather than reinvention. He recounted the origin of Brazil’s iconic yellow shirt, explaining that Brazil wore white in 1950, suffered a traumatic defeat to Uruguay, and subsequently held a competition that produced the yellow design now closely tied to World Cup imagery. Kossmann said superstition has not been part of Adidas’s design process, according to ESPN.
