Moldova 1994-96 Home, matchworn v Turkey
Moldova 2010-14 Home, matchworn/prepared
Moldova 2014-16 Home, matchworn/prepared youth?
Mdolova 2022-24 Home, matchprepared Radu Gînsari v Latvia
Mdolova 2022-24 Third, benchworn Iurie Iovu v ???

Oh Reusch, you really knew how to make things work. Incredibly, this design is technically a template, the only thing that makes it Moldovan is that it is done in the Moldovan flag colour scheme! We’ve got a lot to take in here, with stripes, their classic printed fabric, whatever is going on atop the shoulders and arrows focusing attention on the FA logo’s stripe. It wants to do a lot and really does, without shame or remorse. The sort of thing that’s insane enough to work once, it absolutely does work, whether or not it should!

New to UEFA for the 1996 Euros qualifiers, the Moldovans embarked on their campaign well. They lost (by at least 3 goals) as expected home and away to strong German and Bulgarian opposition, but managed 9 points from the rest of the group, just enough for 4^th place! A 3-2 home and 1-0 away win over Georgia made up the majority, though they’d lose both matches against Albania in a bit of a shock. However, they’d stun Wales 3-2 in Moldova, and only lose 1-0 in Wales itself, to finish above them! While never in danger of qualifying, they matched up well against more established sides, albeit without significant consistency.

Next up, an underwhelming Jako piece. This template never quite did what I felt it should, with the yellow accenting working nicely against the blue at the collar, sleeve cuffs, and on the front. But it is barely applied, with that being it and minimal in most of those. Some of the panelling to the shirt is nicely curved, but not used to actually liven up the design. The logo doesn’t particularly stand out either.

Used across both Euro 2012 and 2014 World Cup qualifiers, Moldova came 5^th in both groups, taking home and away wins over poor San Marino in both too. 2012 qualifiers saw them face the Netherlands, Sweden, Hungary and Finland and generally be a solid, defensive side. They did, however, only add points with a shock 2-0 home win over Finland, but scored enough to make opponents uncomfortable. 2014 saw home draws to Ukraine and Poland as well as a 5-2 away win in Montenegro that nobody saw coming. They finished 2 points behind Poland though, and lost both games against England comfortably.

Next up we start using all 3 colours once again! The yellow only appears in the logos and the Jako shoulder detailing, but red under the arms, on the collar and the sleeves helps to add a little life across the shirt. The front of the shirt also has this fin like pattern pressed into the shirt, with a close pattern up near the shirt’s centre spreading out and down the shirt itself. It is quite nice, but nothing too ground-breaking.

Euro 2016 qualifiers drew them in a group with Austria, Russia, Sweden, Monetnegro and Liechtenstein. Despite several strong teams in their group, they didn’t conceded more than 2 in any matches, resulting in a narrow goal difference. However, they struggled severely to put points on the board, losing every home match, even to Liechtenstein. 1-1 away draws in Liechtenstein and, amazingly, Russia, brought them their only points of the campaign and they’d comfortably finish bottom.

Now these are some incredibly shirts from Jako, showing what they can truly do if they try! Firstly we have the more basic patterns down the sides and on the sleeve cuffs of the shirt for a little country flair without looking too messy. That wouldn’t be enough though, so across the entire body of the shirt, front and rear, are more detailed, heat-pressed Moldovan patterns! Use of the Moldovan national emblem as well as the FA logo helps add even more variety to the shirt and the yellow design’s white sleeves really helps make the shirt pop! Truly spectacular designs.

For much of Euro 2024 qualifiers, Moldova were in with an outside chance at qualifying! They dropped points with a draw in the Faroe Islands, but took 4 points off of top seeds Poland. Singular points from Albania and Czechia would eventually doom them, but a tight group left them in contention for far long than anyone would have predicted. They finished 4^th, 1 point behind Poland and only 5 behind both qualifiers.

For the vast majority of their qualifying appearances Moldova have been last or in the penultimate position, splitting themselves roughly 50-50 between the two. They’ve come away with 0 wins on several occasions and are regarded as one of Europe’s weakest sides, not without good reason. 2024 aside, they’ve never genuinely been in contention for a tournament qualification and their Nations League appearances have backed that up. Starting in League D they were promoted solely due to the restructure only to promptly get relegated after a penalty shootout loss to Kazakhstan. Not quite having enough to get promoted back straight away, they remain a League D side.

Ranked similarly lowly, their women’s side has a handful of results to their name, almost exclusively against other minnows. Inconsistent in their tournament entries, despite a long history of women’s football, they’ve been placed in preliminary rounds where possible and not often escaped. 3 draws means they also finished bottom of their Nations League group, though some of those results were close enough to show promise. The men’s youth sides have seen some promise, with the U21s grabbing regular wins and typically finishing off the bottom of the table. They’ve been mid-table at best, rather than fully threaten a qualification, but aren’t bad. The U19s and U17s have only a bare handful of elite round appearances to their name, but the U17s were at the 2002 Euros after a weak qualifying group with Armenia and Malta. They’d lose all 3 games, 6-3 to Yugoslavia, 4-2 to Spain and 3-2 to Czechia, but it is their only major tournament appearance to date. The women’s youth sides have struggled more severely, with the U19s being more successful, although rarely combining positive results in the same campaign. The U17s have been very poor, with a win over Wales as their only recorded win.

Typically one of the stronger preliminary round qualifying sides, Moldova have been active in senior and youth futsal where possible. The side have never qualified for a euros or a World Cup, but have been relatively regular in the main stage of qualifying, although they struggle significantly against the major players of the sport. Their youth side have not performed as well, ranking a little lower, but are active. Women’s futsal has been even less successful, with 3-3 draws against Belarus and Gibraltar being their only highlights to date. Beach soccer has also been an outlet, with some mixed results. They missed out on the 2023 World Cup in the play-offs, but otherwise have been quite far off the pace in qualifiers. The Euro Beach Soccer League mainly brought similar results, with little success, but 2 stage wins and promotion from League B in 2022 show their improvement. They held on in 2023 to remain in League A, a new era for Moldovan beach soccer seems to be here!

Not expected to provide any meaningful impact on their 2022 qualifying group, Moldova sadly lived up to expectations. They drew 1-1 at home to the Faroe Islands but otherwise scored 5 goals and conceded 30 in reply, losing all 9 other matches and only keeping things within a single goal 3 times. A campaign to forget, even by their standards.

Haiti 2014-15 Away

Gabon 2006-07 Home
Gabon 2012-13 Away

The classic Airness template kicks us off with its stripe down one side punctuated by the logo. Here the flag is solely contained within the top of the stripe, which does make the rest of it a little bit less interesting than some of the other designs of the same template. However, the FA logo fits into it really nicely without being overwhelmed by it and the flag at the collar and sleeve cuff remains classic. Yes, the rear is plain, but, for a template, Airness maintained enough individuality for them to work well.

2008 AFCON qualifiers would prove to be tricky, with Gabon drawn in a group with Ivory Coast, Madagascar and Djibouti, but only the top side qualifying (unless 2^nd did really well). Djibouti would promptly withdraw, eliminating the 2^nd place spot for their group.  They’d comfortably beat Madagascar in both matches, but a 5-0 away loss in the Ivory Coast essentially ended their chances from the 2^nd match. A 0-0 home draw would regain some honour, but they finished in 2^nd, as they would have expected.

We move onto one of the plainest of plain Puma shirts with a little blue around the collar and the 3 Puma logos being the closest it comes to originality at all. Other variants of the template may have had a little detail to them, but not here. Even the FA logo looks to stand out a little too much o the white, there’s just not a lot here to talk about and even less to praise.

Drawn as the top seed in pot 2 for 2014 qualifiers, Gabon were in a good position to challenge top seed Burkina Faso for the World cup play-off spot. However, they opened up with a 0-0 draw against Niger which got worse as they’d fielded an ineligible player and it got annulled as a 3-0 forfeit. They did manage to then beat Burkina Faso but would lose and draw with Congo to eliminate their realistic chance of qualifying. They’d round off the campaign by losing to Burkina Faso and beating Niger to finish 3^rd, 4 points behind 2^nd and 5 behind 1^st.

Gabon are often an upper-middling side in Africa, though they’ve had a few lower moment in their time. They started off inconsistently, not entering often and rarely achieving positive results. However, they’ve entered every qualification since the 1988 AFCON and have taken at least a win in every attempt, with the sole exception of the 2013 AFCON qualifiers. They came closest to a World Cup spot in 2010 qualifiers, with too many draws plaguing their 2018 attempt. On the AFCON side, the wider net for qualification helps them and they’re relatively regular participants. First qualifying in 1994, they made the quarter-finals immediately after in 1996. However, after 3 AFCONs in 4 attempts, they had a bit of a drought and would not return until 2010, though they’ve only missed 3 of the subsequent 8 tournaments. 2012 and 2021 saw them return to the knockout stages, but they’re yet to make a semi-final. 3 CHAN appearances led to a quarter-final as well, but they haven’t been back since 2016. Moderate success has come in regional competition, with them picking up the only UNIFFAC Cup, a CEMAC Cup and 2 UDEAC Cups, though their success is generally older.

As with several other African teams, Gabon’s women’s national team participates inconsistently. They fell out of the rankings after failing to play across all of 2011-14, but initially played as early as 2000. Generally one of the weaker sides in the confederation, they’ve grabbed a few wins against very low tier sides, but not threatened qualification. They were due to host the 2008 WAFCON, but withdrew before the tournament. Recent performances have been better, but participation even more inconsistent. Men’s youth football is broadly similar to the senior side, with a few AFCON qualifications: two U23 AFCONs, five U20s and 3 U17s. However, the inaugural U23 AFCON in 2011 not only saw them qualify, but win the whole thing, reaching the 2012 Olympic Games! They’d lose to Mexico and draw to South Korea and Switzerland but haven’t come close to replicating the feat. Women’s youth football has been very inconsistent for them with the rarity of playing leading to no notable successes from 2 U20 entries and an U17 withdrawal.

Despite their coast, they’ve never tried national beach soccer out, with a similar lack of participation in futsal.

Drawn with continental titans Egypt, Gabon were an outside shot at the play-off spot for topping the group. Generally expected to grab 2^nd place, they met that expectation, but didn’t grab the results they’d have been hoping for regardless. Home victories over Libya and Angola, along with a 1-1 draw with Egypt, gave them a good basis, but losing every away game dragged them down into the other 2 teams and they finished second on goal difference alone, 7 points behind Egypt. Not terrible, but a little disappointing.

American Samoa Home 2015

A very standard Nike kit. 2 blue stripes on a white background with a stitched logo and Nike tick. That’s about it, though the back is more of a breathable mesh which is at least a little different. However, you can’t help but like it, partly because it is an American Samoa shirt and partly because where are you going to get an alternative from? These replica shirts came about due to the film “Next Goal Wins” about them achieving their first victory so you can overlook any complaints about the colour scheme being a little unusual and go and watch the film because it is fantastic. Unsure about the name on the back though, no-one of that name has ever played for the team, must’ve been the original owner?

American Samoa wore this design in qualification for the 2016 OFC Nations Cup, the very first stage of 2018 World Cup Qualification. It proved to be a fairly successful campaign, with a narrow loss to neighbours Samoa followed up by victories over Tonga and the Cook Islands. They went out on goal difference, Samoa being on +3 and American Samoa on +2 (with the Cook Islands just below on +2 but with 2 less goals scored, wow that was close, also poor Tonga).

Is this fairly typical? We don’t have much data for comparison with the new format only coming into play for the 2012 OFC Nations Cup/2014 World Cup Qualification. Prior to that, in 3 campaigns and 12 games, American Samoa lost all 12, scoring 2 and conceding 129, including in that infamous 31-0. Everyone laughed at that and totally failed to take into account that Australia denied all but Nicky Salapu (the goalkeeper) entry to the country so they had to use their third/fourth team (either no passport or exams for all above them). However, 2014 qualification led to their first victory, a crucial draw and an agonising late loss to Samoa to grant Samoa the play-off spot (Samoa won 1-0, breaking from Am Sam hitting the frame of the goal).

Their women’s side has 2 draws ever, both in the Pacific Games. However, they haven’t played often, with their first appearances in the late 90’s but then a significant hiatus. Their latest qualification attempt was considerably better but was still 3 losses, albeit with only 5 goals conceded. Youth football has also not been kind, with wins solely coming from the U-17 men’s side (when they’ve hosted their qualification round) and their U20 women’s side. Otherwise there’s been a smattering of draws and a lot of heavy losses.

Beach Soccer has apparently not caught on, with no appearances but they have debuted at Futsal in 2019. They lost all 3 group stage games (3 goals scored, 28 conceded) before beign dispatched 6-2 by Fiji in placement games. They finished 7^th of 8 teams by a 3-0 walkover as Tonga had gone home. A shame, it would’ve been an interesting game.

Currently World Cup Qualifying hasn’t started for American Samoa, though if the preliminary round stays in, the squad is confident of finally beating their neighbours to the group stage spot.

Tahiti 2011-12 Home
Tahiti 2019 Home DUBIOUS U17 matchprepared?
Tahiti 2019-21 Home
Tahiti 2019-21 Away

Now here’s a lovely old Lotto template. We’ve got a pleasing mix of white and red and whatever the sort of flow-y stripy bits across the front are meant to be to prevent any parts becoming too plain. Is it all supposed to mean anything? No idea! But it does look rather nice and continues onto the back at the top at least. A consequence of this is the centralised logos which here means they are framed nicely but does fall into the typical trap of it gets a bit messed up when numbers are involved. The actual player shirts got around this by not having front numbers and then ruined it by having the badge offset anyway. At least the replicas look nice. Cheers Lotto.

Used across the 2011 Pacific Games and the 2012 Nations Cup, it saw a lot of use for a Pacific shirt. A loss to Fiji and a draw with Papua New Guinea took them into the medal play-off for the 2011 Games on goal difference alone (both them and PNG sharing a 17-1 victory over Kiribati!). There they fell to old rivals New Caledonia and had to settle for bronze by beating Fiji. 2012 saw the Tehau family demolish Samoa, Vanuatu dealt with fairly easily and an intense 4-3 victory over New Caledonia where they were originally 3-0 up. While their rivals knocked out New Zealand, the Tahitians edged past the Solomon Islands 1-0, doing the same to New Caledonia in the final to become the first non-NZ/Australian team to take an OFC international title! The design has quite the history.

Nike templates, Nike templates everywhere! So, plain red or plain white and a simple, but quite nice shield badge. Not really much to say other than “could be worse.” However, the details are where things get interesting. One’s a dubious U17 shirt possibly with experimental printing and yet with a lovely felt badge. The others are direct from Tahiti after 7 months of trying and have a lovely typeface but should say J.Tehau rather than just Tehau (there were 4 Tehau’s after all…)

They used these plain shirts across the 2019 Pacific Games (replacing a different plain Nike template). Losses to Fiji and New Caledonia dropped them into 3^rd place, outside contention for the medal spots, but they did record two 7 goal victories, against Tuvalu and American Samoa (conceding American Samoa’s only goal against another FIFA nation). Their women’s side wore the same design to also come 3^rd in their group, giving Vanuatu their only point and falling far behind the 2 dominant powers of the Cook Islands and Papua New Guinea. A 1-0 win against the Solomons was enough to secure their position though.

In general, Tahiti have fallen slightly from their peak. Prior to 2000 they won every Polynesian Cup, 5 of 10 Pacific Games (and 2 runners-up and 2 third place finishes as well as the ’93 Mini Games title) and reached 3 of 4 Nations Cup finals. Since then, they don’t have too much to show for themselves, with world Cup campaigns tending to collapse at crucial moments (2002, lost to New Zealand in the group decider, 2014, won 1 game from 6 in the final group). They do have a 2^nd, 3^rd and a 4^th place finish from the Pacific Games (but no more titles) and did take the 2012 Nations Cup by storm, winning the title and the right to play Nigeria, Uruguay and Spain. My main memory of the side is their 6-1 defeat to Nigeria, Jonathan Tehau scoring their only goal of the tournament. Otherwise, their Coupe de l’Outre-Mer performances left a lot to be desired with 2 wins from 10.

The women’s side is well established but rarely participates in anything other than the Pacific Games with only 2 Nations Cup appearances, 1 win against Vanuatu, 1 draw against Samoa and 4 losses. 4 Pacific Games appearances brought about two 4^th places and otherwise they’ve always been the “best of the rest.” The men’s youth squads have typically done well in the region, the U20s doing well when they’ve hosted with 2 championships and 2 runners-ups (last won in 2008, runners-up in 2018) but 0 scored and 35 conceded in their 6 games at a World Cup. The U-17s have a string of 2^nd places but came 3^rd in 2018 when 2^nd would’ve finally qualified them. The women’s youth teams have been much less active, though the U20s did come 3^rd in 2019.

Capable at futsal, Tahiti have regularly threatened the higher positions, though they have never won the OFC title. Twice they’ve placed 2^nd, 3^rd and 4^th but they tend to lag behind some of their neighbours. They are titans of beach soccer though, coming 4^th in their home World Cup in 2013 and following that up with two 2^nd places in 2015 and 2017. Twice semi-finalists at the invitational Intercontinental Cup and largely untouchable within the OFC, Tahiti might’ve lost their golden generation, but they are a big name in the sport.

Drawn in the easier 2022 group, the group was devastated by illness leading to them losing to the Solomon Islands as their only match but still going through! Their subsequent knockout match against New Zealand was closely contested, but they were second best and lost 1-0. A decent performance, but we’ll never know what could’ve been if they had more warm up.

Luxembourg 2006-07 Home

Eritrea 2019-21 Home (training)

Guinea-Bissau 2011 Home

Tuvalu 2011 Home

Shirt collecting from Tuvalu started in 2011, with a deal made between the TNFA and Masita in the Netherlands. This was due to the Dutch Support Tuvalu Foundation which later became the Netherlands Oceania Support Foundation. Up to 1,000 were made, with details varying slightly by number and were publically sold. The design is fairly plain but interesting due to the rarity and the old TNFA logo. The colours match those on their flag and there are a few subtle differences that mark it from all the fakes of the design.

The 2011 Pacific Games saw Tuvalu finish 4^th in a group of 6. They handily beat American Samoa 4-0 and drew 1-1 with Guam but otherwise lost fairly comfortably to New Caledonia, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu. They finished ahead of Guam on goal difference alone (-13 v -17) but were 8 points behind the 3 leaders. It was their best performance at the Pacific Games and showed, yet again, that they could compete with the other Polynesian nations.

Tuvalu 2017 Home
Tuvalu 2017 Away
Tuvalu 2017 GK
Tuvalu 2017 Pre-match

Hong Kong based Impact Prowear took up the challenge for 2017 and they delivered in style! A little gold trim at the edges of the sleeves, the fantastic old badge and the 2017 Mini Games logo are a great start. Couple that with beautiful light blue stripes  interspersed with either deep blue or white (blue home and away?) and you have yourself a definite winner. All the detail is sublimated, but that’s not uncommon for them.

In contrast, the GK kit is mad, thin light blue stripes horizontally, with a yellow fading to white down the shirt. Very strange to look at, though easy to get distracted by the long sleeves in the Pacific, which seems inadvisable. Last, but not least, the pre-match shirt combined blue, yellow and white in such a way that it looks like it was in the middle of a massive paint fight. No consistency at all and that makes it gorgeous.

Used across the 2017 Pacific Mini Games, Tuvalu suffered heavy losses to Vanuatu, Fiji and the Solomon Islands, conceding 24 without reply. But, highlights came in a stunning 2-1 win over New Caledonia U23s and a 4-3 comeback against Tonga, where they were 2-0 down at half-time. Finishing 4^th from 6 is definitely respectable for a team with a tenth of even Tonga’s population and a fraction of the budget.

Tuvalu 2018-19 Home
Tuvalu 2018-19 Away
Tuvalu 2018-19 GK
Tuvalu 2018-19 GK

The English company Stingz Prowear created their 2018-19 kit and made some fantastic designs. Each design (barring the GK kits which only varied in colour) was unique and they were all spectacular (not that I’m biased…). A new logo for the federation and a great colour palette, sticking once more with the national colours help make for a great kit, though sponsors on national kits will always be disappointing. Understandable for non-FIFA teams though. Compared with the varying shades of blue for the home, the away perhaps slightly disappoints with less variety but that can easily be forgiven.

The GK kits were the true stars of the show, no pun intended, with the black in particular having the sharp contrasts with the gold details. The star, as from the flag representing the islands of Tuvalu, radiates out beautifully from the TIFA logo, fading slightly as it goes. The rear of the shirt is a little plainer, but still has the stripes to prevent it being plain.

Stingz kits saw their debut for Tuvalu at the 2018 CONIFA 2018 World Football Cup, where they lost heavily to tournament favourites Padania and Székely Land. Their final group stage game was a competitive affair against Matabeleland but, amidst stunning opposition support, they fell 3-1. A 5-0 loss to UKJ followed in the placement rounds and then a heart-breaking 4-3 loss to Tamil Eelam where they’d led 3-1 going into the final 5 minutes. A friendly against the Chagos Islands rounded things out on a high note with a dominant 6-1 win.

The 2019 Pacific Games continued the use of these kits, though results didn’t go well. A 1-1 draw against American Samoa continued their good results against other Polynesian nations but Tahiti (French Polynesia) and the Melanesians of the group (New Caledonia, Solomon Islands and Fiji) punished them, with 41 goals scored and just the 1 conceded. They finished bottom of the group on goal difference.

Tuvalu have attended 5 Pacific Games and 1 Pacific Mini Games, the only tournaments they are allowed to compete in and results typically follow the same patterns as above. They’ve shown strong results against fellow minnows Kiribati and the “qualifying nations” of the OFC (Samoa, American Samoa, Tonga and the Cook Islands) but otherwise have typically suffered in games against higher quality opposition. A 2-1 wins over the New Caledonia U23s in the 2017 Pacific Mini Games was very much the exception, but sadly hasn’t provided a springboard to success. 2007 was when they made history though. They drew 1-1 with Tahiti, lost 1-0 to New Caledonia, 4-1 to Cook Islands and the less said about 16-0 Fiji, the better. But, their participation did mean they are the only non FIFA side to participate in World Cup Qualification, with the tournament being used as the initial stage for 2010 Oceanian qualification.

Women’s football is alive and well on the islands, but Tuvalu have never fielded a women’s team in a full international game, with funding being the most likely issue, though sources state that it may not be a priority of the FA. Along with youth national sides, they may have participated in certain seasons of Tuvaluan football but again, little to nothing international is available for them.

OFC Beach Soccer has typically been a small affair so there’s been nothing there for Tuvalu but futsal has been more active. They attended the 2008, 2010 and 2011 Oceanian Futsal Championships but lost every game, even against Kiribati in the placement rounds for 2011, scoring 17 and conceding 146 across 16 games. A 3-2 loss to Kiribati in 2011 and 3-1 to Tahiti in 2008 were the main highlights, if they can be called that.

Tuvalu aren’t a member of FIFA, despite trying to join since the 1980’s. Their lack of sufficient infrastructure on the islands means they can’t host games to a FIFA standard. Their football is better developed than several nations who were allowed in FIFA but their associate membership of the OFC has provided little to no benefit to them. Will they ever get a chance as full FIFA members? I dearly hope so, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Saint Helena 2019 Away/Home GK
Saint Helena 2023 Home

A very nice deep blue is complimented by these lovely red and white swirls that look almost painted on. Each sleeve also has a much smaller version of the white swirls to add some additional interesting factors. Yes, it is cheaply made, all detail is sublimated, but that’s no surprise considering how much it cost for them to just play! Doubles up as the away outfield and the home GK, the only flaw I have with it is that the yellow of the badge doesn’t really fit with the rest of the shirt. But then the yellow and green version looked “too Australian” so maybe I’m just contrary.

The 2019 Inter Games saw the international debut of St Helena using these kits. They beat the Holyhead Hotspur Reserves 2-0 and lost 7-2 to Ynys Môn as warm up games before starting the tournament proper. Thrown in a tough group with Guernsey and Shetland, they were always going to struggle. They grabbed their first competitive international goal with a penalty but otherwise were handily beaten 6-1 by Shetland in front of a large crowd. Away from the weekend, support dwindled but that might’ve been for the best with a 9-0 loss to Guernsey. In the 9^th place play-off against the Western Isles, they went behind early, only to equalise early in the second half. They dropped deeper and deeper, hoping for penalties but conceded a late winner to finish last in the standings. Some great goalkeeping and slick passing showed their potential, but lack of experience sank their tournament hopes.

Next up we have an interesting, spotty design. The spots vary in size to create a wave-like pattern across the entirety of the shirt with only minimal white accenting on the sleeve cuffs and collar, though weirdly some on the shoulders too that doesn’t really fit. Colours are the traditional yellow/green for the island, with the badge fitting in quite well. My contrary, Australian-like opinions do resurface, but I still quite like the shirt. Again though, it is cheaply made, with it being hard to see anything changing for them in the near future.

This will be used in the 2023 Island Games, after the 2021 edition was delayed for 2 years. As with 2019, their jouney is a long (St Helena – South Africa – Qatar – UK – Guernsey) and expensive one. Drawn in a group with Jersey, Menorca and Gozo, their path isn’t an easy one. Gozo are the big unknown and might be an interesting match before placement matches for the islanders, but they won’t be expected to compete with the big two of the group.

Otherwise St Helena have very few matches to their name. They have occasional matches against visiting navy ships, but with limited funding, no chance at joining a confederation and their sheer geographic isolation, the Island Games are their best bet. Look forward to seeing more of them there.