Arsenal to switch to adidas kits in 2019

Back in April, I was suckered in by a footyheadlines April Fool’s Day story claiming Arsenal were on the verge of signing a massive new deal to make adidas the club’s new kit manufacturer. Hands up, that was dumb and I was dumb for buying it.

Well, guess what? Here we are in December, which is emphatically not April, and now that same source is claiming...that Arsenal are about to sign a new deal with adidas to become their kit sponsor from the 2019 season onwards. The article claims that Arsenal are going to buy their way out of their Puma contract, that Puma is on the verge of becoming Manchester City’s kit maker, and that Arsenal will get anywhere from £80 million to a frankly not realistic £180 million a year from adidas over the course of the deal.

Shirt deals are one place where Arsenal always struggle - they are sort of “off cycle”, in that their deals lapse after the deals of the Chelseas and the Manchesters of the world, so Arsenal sign what seems to be a massive deal (like the £30 million a season they get from Puma) only to see that destroyed a year later by one of the three big money clubs in the league.

Whether that pattern would continue here, I have no idea, but the idea of Arsenal getting close to their worth in a kit deal is pretty exciting. And again, selfishly, if they sign with adidas, that’s good for me because their employee store is in Portland and offers 50% discounts.