{"id":857396,"date":"2026-03-29T03:28:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-29T03:28:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/857396\/"},"modified":"2026-03-29T03:28:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T03:28:13","slug":"kit-confusion-us-and-belgian-players-cant-tell-which-teams-jersey-is-which-from-distance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/857396\/","title":{"rendered":"Kit confusion: US and Belgian players can&#8217;t tell which team&#8217;s jersey is which from distance"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Your support helps us to tell the story<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 iCTyfe\">From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it&#8217;s investigating the financials of Elon Musk&#8217;s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, &#8216;The A Word&#8217;, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 iCTyfe\">At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 iCTyfe\">The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.<\/p>\n<p><strong class=\"sc-1uza6dc-1 cglitp\">Your support makes all the difference.<\/strong>Read more<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/christian\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Christian<\/a> Pulisic couldn&#8217;t figure out teammates from opposing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/belgian\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Belgians<\/a> in a friendly with kit confusion.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat can\u2019t happen. It was a bit strange,\u201d the U.S. star said after Saturday&#8217;s 5-2 loss to Belgium.<\/p>\n<p>The U.S. wore its new <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/nike\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Nike<\/a> jerseys with red and white horizontal stripes that resemble a waving flag, an apparent homage to American jerseys at the 1994 World Cup with vertical red-and-white stripes.<\/p>\n<p>Belgium had on its new <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/adidas\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Adidas<\/a> road jerseys with a background of a light color called Frozen Blue mixed with pink and black trim, a tribute to surrealist artist Ren\u00e9 Magritte.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt definitely was a little bit difficult whenever you do like a quick glance to tell which was which. It was almost like a 50-50 thing,\u201d American midfielder Weston McKennie said. \u201cSo you definitely have to maybe take a little more time on the ball before you made a decision or play one touch to a player.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Both teams exchanged uniform plans well ahead of the match, according to the U.S. Soccer Federation, and the outfits were cleared before the game by the match officials. <\/p>\n<p>Belgium\u2019s home jersey in a solid red while the U.S.\u2019s other is dark blue with a subtle star pattern and red trim, which it plans to wear for Tuesday\u2019s friendly against Portugal.<\/p>\n<p>While the flawed fashions became apparent during the first half, neither team had different sets of jerseys on site they could switch to at the break.<\/p>\n<p>Decisions could depend on shorts \u2014 the U.S. wore blue and Belgium white. The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/americans\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Americans<\/a> had white socks and the Belgians blue.<\/p>\n<p>Players hadn&#8217;t been concerned about the game&#8217;s sartorial aspects.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI didn\u2019t know until we took off the pre-match, whatever, shirts and then saw it and I was like \u2014 everyone was a bit shocked,\u201d Pulisic said. \u201cA lot of times you get the ball, you look up, you can\u2019t really lock in on something. You only can base it off the color of the shirt. That\u2019s how it works. And when it\u2019s very similar, it&#8217;s difficult.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>___<\/p>\n<p>AP soccer: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/soccer<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":857397,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5311],"tags":[49,978,659],"class_list":{"0":"post-857396","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-united-states","9":"tag-us","10":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116310343939753596","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/857396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=857396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/857396\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/857397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=857396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=857396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=857396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}