In some ways it's gone by in the blink of an eye, but here we are at the end of July, 17 months of various stages of COVID19 enforced lockdown later and at last in England lockdown is (currently) pretty much over.
July yielded one of my holy grail shirts, and one of my most precious. This is a proper vintage football shirt and one I feel privileged to get my hands on.
This is a matchworn 1980-1983 Brighton & Hove Albion home shirt, made by adidas and worn by the Seagulls in the English first division.
This shirt was worn by Steve Gatting who signed for Brighton from Arsenal in in 1981 and made 316 league appearances for the Albion between 1981-1991.
An interesting difference between this and the fans replica shirts from the time is that the sponsor logo reads British Caledonian Airways but on the fans replicas it just read British Caledonian. To confuse the issue further, the players sometimes wore shirts with the two line logo too, and in this team photo they wore both!
I did take delivery of another holy grail Brighton shirt in July, but this time it was the return of my 1989-1991 away shirt that had been on loan at the National Football Museum .
They displayed it in their "Strip, How Football Got Shirty" exhibition, perhaps as a means to get people to leave at the end of a long visit!
This particular shirt was worn by iconic Albion right back John Crumplin, nicknamed "Football Genius" by the Brighton fans. He was a fans favourite at a time when the club was slipping into the doldrums and falling into the grip of the asset strippers who were determined to destroy the club.
Time to go Down Under now, I have an eclectic collection to say the least, and when I see an interesting or different shirt I'll generally see if I can get my hands on one.
This is the 2021 home shirt of Australian National Premier Leagues side Adelaide City, I saw it being promoted online and ordered it back in April, I'd almost forgotten about it, it was a nice surprise when it arrived in July.
Another Pre-Order that arrived in July was this striking Dilton Marsh Wanderers away shirt for the 2020-2021 Trowbridge and District Football League season.
It's made by the fantastic Hope and Glory Sportswear brand who have made some amazing kits over the past few years.
Last but not least for July, and lockdown collecting, we have a shirt from North America.
This is a Providence City shirt, made as an interim/temporary kit before the official 2021 shirts were ready.
Made by the Inaria Soccer brand they were used for a series of pre season friendlies, and they won the Massachusetts Werner Fricker Cup wearing this kit. The club sold the shirts off once their actual kits were in place.
I hope that is it for "Lockdown Collecting" and I hope you all continue following the guidance and stay safe. I'll be back next month, but I think I'll do something a bit different, it'll be about football shirts of course, but perhaps a bit more nerdy!
To see many more football shirts from my collection please take a look at my other blog posts here and to see even more shirts from all over the world please take a look at my website www.oldfootballshirt.com.