Category: Editorial

This Milan 1963 home retro football shirt harks back to the days where football – and indeed the world at large – was far simpler. Many would say things were a lot more stylish, too. Just note the elegant design of this shirt with its clean, no-fuss nature and classy collar.

Long gone is the notion of a team’s colours. Milan are the Rossoneri. Red and black. They fight tooth and nail to gain the upper hand on local rivals Inter, the Nerazzurri. Blue and black. Teams used to wear their own colours whenever they could. Milan were the Rossoneri both at San Siro and on the road. Only when there was a clash of colours would they change to their away kit.

Nowadays, even the notion of having a home and away kit has gone out of the window. We have third kits so manufacturers can extract even more money out of our pockets. Milan wore a one-off special home kit at home to Bologna last month. And in Napoli’s case, they now have a fourth, fifth, sixth and who knows up to what number kit each and every season.

The cycle of releases followed by immediate rumours of the next kit, leaks and designs firming up before an eventual release to great fanfare is tedious to many football fans. Given that so many of those new releases openly aim to pay homage and reinvent classic shirt designs of yesteryear, there’s a strong argument for just going back to the roots of it all with your next shirt purchase.

If that sounds like you, this Milan 1963 home retro football shirt should be right up your street. A classic, timeless piece of football history, in which the Rossoneri became the best team in Europe. They may have worn their away kit in the final against Benfica – who were the defending back-to-back champions and also a team in red – but the Serie A giants won the European Cup for the first time in their history on the back of a campaign donning this stunning shirt.

– HISTORY –

“We will be a team of devils. Our colours will be red like fire and black to invoke fear in our opponents!” Milan were established back in December 1899 by a man called Herbert Kilpin, who was the first English footballer to play abroad. These were his words when he founded Milan Foot-Ball and Cricket Club, providing the origins for the team’s nicknames and home colours.

Il Diavolo have been the Rossoneri ever since, with their red and black stripes instantly recognisable around the world. There have been some deviations and variations on the theme down the years, not least when Milan moved from their original thin stripes to the thicker design they wore during a successful spell during the 1950s.

In the following decade though, the Rossoneri returned to their thinner stripes, and it was in this design that Milan became the first ever Italian team to win the European Cup. Real Madrid famously won the first five editions of this tournament between 1956 and 1960, before Portuguese outfit Benfica beat Barcelona and then Madrid in the final to triumph in both 1961 and 1962.

Despite going behind to a Eusebio opener in the 1963 European Cup Final at Wembley, a second-half brace from Italian-Brazilian icon Jose ‘Mazzola’ Altafini secured a memorable comeback victory for legendary manager Nereo Rocco’s side. That was the first of Milan’s seven successes in the European Cup/Champions League, as Il Diavolo added continental glory to the eighth Scudetto they’d won the season before.

– GALLERY –

– DESIGN –

Elegant. Timeless. Classic. If you had three words to sum up the design of the Milan 1962-63 home shirt, it’s tough to stray too far from those. In terms of the original, thin-striped Rossoneri design, it doesn’t get much better than this.

To take the title of a song by early 2000s UK pop group Hear’Say, the design of this shirt is pure and simple. There’s no sponsor emblazoned across the front to muddy the water and spoil the look, while there’s not even a kit manufacturer logo – never mind the awful new shirt sponsor trend.

Furthermore, this shirt doesn’t even carry the Milan badge itself. Instead, there’s an Italian crest on the chest, harking back to a time when football tribalism was perhaps a little less vitriolic. Fierce, yes, but abusive? Much less so. The design of this shirt – which features a stylish black trim on the collar and sleeves – stirs up nostalgic feelings that allow us to forget about some of our misgivings concerning the modern game when wearing it.

Football nowadays tries to be a lot of things it’s not. The Milan 1963 home shirt cannot be accused of that. 3Retro have done a great job of recreating the look of this shirt with its large open neck collar and colourful Italy shield. The material feels great, and allows you to comfortably wear a shirt that’s been meticulously researched to be as close to the original jersey as possible.

– PRICE –

Another bug bear with modern kits are the spiralling prices we’ve been seeing over recent years. Whether you’re buying a new shirt for yourself or as a gift for friends or family, the cost of showing your colours has skyrocketed.

Not so with this vintage shirt, which is priced at just £35. This means it’s an affordable alternative to splashing out on the latest Milan kit, which will be out of date in only a matter of months. Indeed, this is a shirt that’ll never be out of date.

Click here to purchase your Milan 1963 home retro football shirt at 3Retro via our sponsored link.

– SUMMARY –

If you love vintage football shirts and enjoy the warm feelings of nostalgia they drum up, this is the Milan shirt for you.

With the Rossoneri within touching distance of securing their first Scudetto in more than a decade, this is the perfect time to celebrate the Diavolo’s maiden European Cup success. They may have worn their changed white strip in the final, but the likes of Cesare Maldini, Giovanni Trapattoni, Gianni Rivera and Jose Altafini wore this shirt with distinction – and now you can too.

Pull on this shirt to forget about sleeve sponsors and commercialism and hatred and overt tribalism that tears us apart. Instead, celebrate the Rossoneri with a shirt that reminds us we all love and compete for Italian football – while retaining the fire and fear invoked by the iconic red and black stripes.