Barcelona and their fans have been made to wait for the club's 2024-25 away kit, despite them having already played two games on the road in LaLiga this season.
In fact, the team wore last season's yellow fourth alternate kit for their first match under new coach Hansi Flick, a 2-1 win at Valencia on Aug. 17, before wearing their new half-and-half home jersey in each of their other three games.
But, ahead of Sept. 15's Catalan derby at Girona ( stream LIVE at 12:15 p.m. ET on ESPN+ ), Barça have finally delivered a new shirt that was worth the wait.
It is only the fourth black away kit that the club have ever had, with previous incarnations coming in 2011-12, 2013-14 and most recently in 2020-21, when Barça adopted a gold-tinged design that proved a big hit among fans.
This year's version is a stripped back design, with the club crest and Nike swoosh blacked out and given an iridescent blue and red sheen to increase the stealth quota of the jersey ten-fold. The famous blaugrana stripes are then added asymmetrical to the flanks of the torso.
As part of Barça 's 125th birthday celebrations, the club's bespoke anniversary scroll logo has also been printed inside the shirt, just beneath the back of the collar.
However, while the kit certainly ranks highly for its stealthy style, black jerseys have not been portents for winning the biggest prizes.
In 2011-12 Barça won the Copa del Rey , Spanish Super Cup, UEFA Super Cup, and FIFA Club World Cup quadruple in the last season of Pep Guardiola's tenure as coach. Tata Martino then won another Spanish Super Cup in 2013-14 (in a season that also saw Barça pipped to the league title by Atlético Madrid on the final day of the campaign) before Ronald Koeman added a further Copa del Rey to the trophy cabinet in 2020-21, the Dutchman's sole full season in charge at Camp Nou.
That means that not once have Barça claimed LaLiga or Champions League titles in seasons in which they have worn black kits. Maybe it will be fourth time lucky?
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