World Cup shirts have accumulated a wealth of strange stories throughout the tournament's history, as certain designs became legends on account of bans, last-minute modifications, or unconventional details.
A report published by The Athletic highlighted some of the most notable stories linked to national team kits, beginning with Cameroon, which produced one of football's most talked-about designs in 2002.
Cameroon wore a sleeveless shirt designed by Puma during the 2002 Africa Cup of Nations in Mali — a tournament they won, beating Senegal on penalties in the final. The design was intended to help players cope with high temperatures and to reduce shirt-pulling between players.
Former Cameroon international Patrick Suffo explained that players felt very comfortable in the design, confirming it helped them in Mali's sweltering conditions. He also argued that the powerful look it gave the Cameroon players provided a psychological advantage over their opponents.
FIFA refused to approve the shirt for the 2002 World Cup in South Korea and Japan because the absence of sleeves meant there was no place for the tournament's official badges. Puma was forced to modify the design by adding black sleeves before the team's participation in the tournament.
Rob Warner, one of the shirt's designers at Puma, revealed that the modification process was not straightforward, because the original design had not been built to accommodate conventional sleeves. An extremely flexible fabric was therefore used to preserve the players' freedom of movement.
Cameroon was not the only such case in major tournament history. The report noted that Haiti was required to alter its shirt ahead of the 2026 World Cup after FIFA objected to imagery referencing the 19th-century Haitian Revolution, deeming it a political message prohibited under tournament regulations.
FIFA also asked Belgium to modify their change shirt at the 2022 World Cup, while Ukraine's Euro 2020 shirt drew objections after it featured a map of the country.
The 1986 World Cup produced one of the strangest kit stories of all, when Argentina resorted to buying replacement shirts from a market in Mexico City before their quarter-final against England, because the official shirt was too heavy. The shirts were then altered to add the national team crest and numbers, making the No. 10 shirt worn by Diego Maradona in that match one of the most famous in football.
The 1974 World Cup brought another story, involving Dutch star Johan Cruyff, who wore a shirt bearing only two stripes on the sleeves instead of the Adidas three, owing to a personal sponsorship contract he held with Puma.
Brazil changed the identity of their shirt following their 1950 World Cup defeat to Uruguay, abandoning the white kit and launching a competition to choose a new design inspired by the colours of the Brazilian flag. The result was the iconic yellow shirt that became synonymous with the Samba Boys.