醫生爸爸愛足球: Does shirt color affect footballer performance?

2018-06-19

Does shirt color affect footballer performance?

Green football shirt in green background

Although I choose green as my election color, I am surprised that some national football team footballers wear green shirt in World Cup, namely Saudi Arabia, Senegal and Nigeria. I cannot see clearly the green players in a green grass background!

Does shirt color affect footballer performance?

[Source: picture captured in ViuTV]

World Cup histories

Reviewing world cup history from year 1930 to 2014, I search for home and away shirt color of two finalists each year, for example, Brazil is one mark for yellow and one for blue, while Germany is white and green. The results are listed at the following table. White and blue are outstanding.

Literature review

There was an experimental study examining the effects of outfit color on the assessment of the positions of computer-animated football players in a video set-up. This study showed that the position of players wearing white outfits was better assessed in 5.2% of the trials compared to players wearing green outfits (P = 0.007) [1].

A matched-pairs analysis of red and non-red wearing teams in eight English cities shows significantly better performance of red teams over a 55-year period [2].

Another study including archival data from 7720 matches contested over the first 20 seasons of the English Premier League were analysed. The data show that teams wearing red are more successful than teams wearing other colors, and that teams are more successful in home games than in away games (home advantage index = 0.608). The home advantage has also remained consistent over time (1992/1993-2011/2012) and is greater in low-ability teams (teams with lower league positions) than in high-ability teams. After controlling for team ability, it was found that teams opting for red shirts in their home games did not show a greater home advantage than teams opting for other color shirts [3].

The color of shirt affects players' visual detection. A study analyzed the number of offside judgments for 1530 matches from the first and second division of the football league in Germany and recorded the color of shirts. Data analyses revealed that attacking teams wearing black shirts and black stockings were accompanied by fewer offside decisions. In contrast, defending teams wearing black or green kits were accompanied by increased offside judgments against the opposing teams. Thus, it seems that black and green kits yielded favorable offside judgments. Regarding the low color contrast with green uniforms on a green lawn and the lower detection rate of dark colors the results suggest that green and black kits are less visible, which may impede players' visual detection [4].

My experiences

During a soccer match in a big green soccer pitch, I need to look briefly and quickly where my teammates are. It is difficult for me to find my teammate in black shirt in one evening.