Umbro presents the "Unforgotten" collection inspired by the 1966 WC

There are a few months left to the beginning of the 2018 World Cup and to celebrate the upcoming kickoff of the tournament that will be held in Russia, Umbro wanted to celebrate the 1966 Mundial, highlighting the role of the Soviet team. The “Unforgotten” collection of the English brand has almost nothing to do with played football, being more a reference to a marketing story, that starts with Harold Humphreys, founder of Umbro, and his son John, that ahead of the tournament decided that their brand would’ve dominated the World Cup played in England.

To do that, John Humphreys started to travel the world, trying to convince all the sixteen participant nations to wear the famous Double Diamond. He almost got to do that because, even if they all agreed in principle, at the last moment Russia refused to wear Umbro during the World Cup. This story was the inspiration for Umbro SS18 “Unforgotten” collection, ahead of the World Cup that will be played in the Soviet country.

Umbro collection is divided into two parts: one, called “Missing Team”, uses the colors of the Soviet flag, mixing the retro sportswear with Russian streetwear aesthetic - something like the Gosha Rubchinskiy x adidas Football collabo - with an alternative version of the logo using the Soviet font. The fifteen blue dots represent the participant nations to the 1966 World Cup, while the red one represents Russia, the only team not to wear the Double Diamond. The other part of the collection is called “Lev”, homaging the legendary Russian goalkeeper Lev Yashin, and it’s mainly black, as the Soviet goalie used to be called “Black Spider” for his habit to wear black in every game. 

The Umbro "Unforgotten" collection drops on April 25.