James Garner, Tim Iroegbunam, Jake O'Brien and Toni Payne wear the Everton home shirt for the 2025/26 season
James Garner, Tim Iroegbunam, Jake O'Brien and Toni Payne wear the Everton home shirt for the 2025/26 season
Everton have unveiled their home kit for 2025/26, their historic first season at Hill Dickinson Stadium. The shirt, featuring what the club describe as a mesmeric patterned ‘wave’ that flows throughout the shirt, takes inspiration from the ‘royal blue’ Mersey that provides the backdrop for their stunning new waterfront home.
As always, Evertonians have got plenty of different opinions on the design, so members of the ECHO sportsdesk have been asked to have their say and here are their thoughts...
Joe Thomas
I quite like the kit. This will be an historic season for Everton and Castore and the club have attempted something a bit different. That the kit is inspired by the Mersey the new ground sits alongside makes perfect sense and the wave design is an interesting take on that.
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It is certainly a kit that stands out and, when combined with the blue socks, I think next season will be one in which Everton look very distinctive - a new kit for a new ground and a new era.
So I am a fan of it, and I think the Castore kits and training gear last year often looked better when seen in person, rather than promotional images, so hopefully my view will only improve.
The reality is that feelings towards pretty much any kit are cemented in hindsight. If Everton have an indifferent season then this will likely become forgotten, save for the memories of the first campaign at the Hill Dickinson. If it is a success then the verdict will ultimately be far more positive.
For now, it’s something a bit different and I don’t mind that. And I like that the club is making shirts for sale without the Stake logo.
Chris Beesley
My first thought on seeing the 2025/26 kit is that I preferred the one worn for 2024/25, the final season at Goodison Park. While they’re a Merseyside-based firm, I’m still not entirely convinced by Castore’s designs either and I hope that the embarrassment of seeing the heat-sealed crest falling off Idrissa Gueye’s royal blue jersey in Sligo after flapping in the Atlantic winds that batter the west coast of Ireland can be avoided this time around.
The wave effect to replicate club’s move to the banks of the Mersey is a well-meaning and topical touch as they relocate after 133 years in Walton to Bramley-Moore Dock, but whether that is aesthetically pleasing is another thing. The shirt seems to draw inspiration from the Everton jersey worn between 1986-89 – including their last title-winning season – and that was the first one I owned as a child, so there will be a certain amount of sentimentality with that, but like when Le Coq Sportif tried to replicate Howard Kendall’s glory days with their oversized reboot of the 1983-85 ‘white v’ in 2009, I’m left thinking the original was better.
It’s interesting that they’ve gone back to royal blue socks, after a few people liked the look of them in the FA Cup third round tie against Peterborough United in January which was the first game of the post-Sean Dyche era. Everton haven’t had royal blue socks as part of their home kit since 2012/13, the final season of David Moyes’ first spell, and have worn white for all but one of the dozen years since with the exception being 2014/15 when they sported navy blue socks.
Matt Jones
The socks being blue is good - the 2014/15 kit is one of the best of the Premier League era, when they used navy socks. Otherwise, I'm struggling for positives.
The Castore shirts have left a lot to be desired in my opinion, especially compared to the previous manufacturer Hummel. For two iconic campaigns - the last at Goodison Park and the first at Hill Dickinson Stadium - they've produced a couple of jerseys that won't live long in the memory really.
The waves feature is a nice idea given the move down to the waterfront, but it doesn't quite work on the royal blue jersey for me. A pattern like that just doesn't feel very Everton. But maybe we should embrace change on the brink of this new era?
Admittedly, as a thirty-something man who rarely buys replica gear I'm not the target market for these kits. It will surely be more popular among the younger generation, which is more important.
Everton are obviously getting well paid by Castore as part of the deal too, which will have a positive knock-on effect to what we see out on the pitch. Commercially at least, the partnership makes sense.
Utimately, if the team does well the shirt will grow on everyone. Those who don't like it won't end up minding it, those who like it will end up loving it.
But the design and cost - a whopping £80 for the 'cheaper' replica version - means I won't be rushing out to get one.