If the Luke shirt was visited by the ghost of Didier Six, it now very much possesses the soul of Jack Grealish
Aston Villa Home Shirt 2018/19
The Aston Villa home shirt of the 2018/19 season will ultimately be remembered for bringing Wembley success in the Championship play-off final. The shirt was the result of a novel three-way kit collaboration between Fanatics, Villa and Luke menswear.
While Fantatics actually manufactured the shirt, it was a big marketing success for Luke, as they swiftly boosted their profile amongst the Villa fanbase.
The shirt saw a return to a dark claret, after the pinky purple of the previous season’s Under Armour shirt. As we recent shirt design, nods to the past were included, with quadruple banded ribbed cuffs and V-neck signifying Villa’s position as one of the 12 founding members of William McGregor’s football league. A symbol of McGregor’s statue outside Villa Park is featured on the upper back of the shirt.
The shirt was a firm fan favourite with an 180% + uplift in pre-order sales compared to last season. Also, the shirt did well with the pollsters, it came in 4th in FourFourTwo’s 20 best kits of the 2018/19 season, which was pretty good considering Villa were a Championship team at that stage.
In going for claret sleeves and a claret panelled look, the shirt clearly took its inspiration from a MOMS favourite Villa shirt design of the 1984-1985 home shirt.
If the Luke shirt was visited by the ghost of Didier Six, it now very much possesses the soul of Jack Grealish.
Best Player to Wear the Shirt?
The shirt will be synonymous with the rise of Jack Grealish. Ironically, after a lengthy spell on the sidelines not wearing the shirt, due to injury, he was named captain on his return in a 4-0 home win against Derby County, and went on to inspire a Villa record-breaking 10-game winning run that fired the club into the play-offs and eventually into the Premier League via a memorable day at Wembley.
Best Result in the Shirt
While the Play-off Final at Wembley against Derby County was obviously the clincher in terms of promotion, it was the aforementioned 4-0 first-half blitz of Derby at Villa Park that has to take the accolade. With Villa’s season looking very much to be over, that display inspired by a returning Grealish, was like an adrenaline shot to the system. A 10-game winning run later and Villa were suddenly back in business and carrying important momentum into the play-offs.
Best Deal on Shirt
Due to the novelty of the Luke marketing deal and the initial production run not meeting the surprising demand, there was never an end of season surplus of shirts kicking around. Hence, no sale or any surplus sock being picked up by the likes of Classic Football Shirts. It’s already a difficult shirt to now track down from resellers, although the odd one does pop up on eBay.
*The shirts score is a combined tally of design, Villa’s success in it and fan’s rating
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