I've incorporated a poll into this thread, one of my series of "threads which have interesting things to discuss other than newbies posting crap threads on a daily basis". The question is self-explanitory - which boot has revolutionised the market most, and why? The candidates adidas TUNIT - The first boot that you could fully customise with different insoles and stud configurations. Unrivalled in terms of compatibility to conditions at the moment. adidas Predator - The boot that has been going strong for ten years. Undoubtedly it has changed in that time, but still was the first boot to claim that it improved an element of your game - the "vamps which help you swerve the ball better". adidas Copa - Hasn't been going 25 years for nothing. Full leather, well made boot - the choice of pro's at the 1982 World Cup, and still the choice of pro's at the 2006 World Cup. Nike Mercurial/Vapor - The first boot designed purely with speed in mind. In recent times the boot has used Nike First-Touch coating and, more recently, NikeSkin to give you better touch and, apparently, get you 100m down the pitch in a quicker time than the average boot. Nike's Air Zoom range - From the Zm Airs, to the Air Zoom Total 90 range, to the LASER, this boot has changed face so many times, but still provides pros with the reliability and stability they crave on the pitch. Puma King - These boots have been around for years, and with good cause. Sturdy construction, mould to your feet well - you know exactly what you're getting with Kings, and you look fly into the bargain. The other option is "other" - if you feel the winner isn't one of these then select "other" and tell us why! Discuss.
I chose the Predator range as it was the first boots to really add gimmiks to a boot and be advertised to aftificially improve a player's ability.
Agreed I also think the Puma V1's in a couple years will be up there they are getting popular and I think are a big step toward how super boots will be made Carbon fiber and simple designs !
i want to say tunits but the concept is far better than the product. it is the predator range with the vamps and now powerpulse. in 10 years i can't wait to see what they will look like then.
I think it has to be the Preds. I think Adidas signing Becks did them a massive favour and at the start that is why these boots were so popular. Now they have just kinda become a 'cult' football item. I think pretty much everyone has owned or tried a pair of predators at some point. I love vapors but i don't think they have had quite the same effect on the marker as predators. Maybe thats because most people thought they were flashy. Or because of the stupid £139.99 price tag made most people steer clear! appleCORR
Im gonna disagree and go for nike mercurial line. I accept preds have prolly moved more units as well as surviving since theo walcott was in diapers, but I rekon the pure lightweight speed design brief of the nike's has been taken on board by EVERY major company. I disagree with apps reasoning, to me the fact that boots have become the collectable fashion accessory they have isn't the same as revolutionising the market. An icon like Becks would have pushed the banana yellow hummels (I think, correct if wrong) that Fashanu wore to the moon, sure the combination of gimmick and superstar exponentially benefitted this, but to me the actual design brief of preds, a boot designed to help players strike the ball harder with more swerve by utilising pulsion rubber fins, died on it's arse and as bigg says, is just a token gesture now to keep the name alive. The design brief of the vapor, a superlightweight thin minimalist cleat built for speed, has been replicated in adidas's f50 series, Puma's V1s, Lotto, Mizuno, the list goes on, and to me this is far removed from how cleats had been made in the previous century of soccer. Preds were normal boots with things stuck on, essentially accomodating new ideas on an existing theme whereas the mercurial line was from a fresh blueprint. It is arguable that the smooth strikezone created by the foldover tongue on later preds inspired the innovations of assymetrical lacing, lacesless strikezones etc, but they weren't even nearly the first boot to have such a tongue, and the changes came more from a company pandering to the fashion whims of their headliner than any pre-conceived decision ofr functional change. Lastly, my reasoning is the gut instinct I had when first seeing each, sure, the preds flabbergasted me, but I was like "what the heck r those thing on those footy booty" whereas when I first saw the mercurials, I barely recognised them as cleats...
I think if you could buy the Puma V1.06 on the high street that these would be more popular. I'm constantly getting asked where i get mine from and which stores have them. I don't see why Puma don't supply stores with them? appleCORR
how about the zhero gravity?? $350 and they don't even come with laces!! I mean c'mon, charging that kind of money for a pair of boots revolutionizes a market if ya ask me...
In the Puma shop on Carnaby Street they say they have a partnership with Sports Soccer as the official supplier of Puma boots...even though they have three shops that are all in London
cool post case ps anyone remember beckhams short time with those cica blades he wore in 96 or 97? i remember seeing the poster in clarks and wondering who this fresh faced, moses parted hair footballer was
yea becks wore both brands, for a VERY short time back when so looking at the voting, 2 of the mercurial voters are MYSTERIOUSLY annonymous... ISH! Just remembered I forgot to vote for local council elections today! Guess thats me biting my tongue for 4 years whenever I wanna complain about local issues! EDIT: re-reading my post, I seem to be saying Becks would wear a pair of hummels to the moon, man my lack of "gramma" means I talk even more bs online than in person! Anyone remeber if they were indeed hummel?
The Copa takes the cake, almost every boot company or design has ripped it off in some way. The Stadio to the Speciali, Tiempo Permier to the Intergrity, all of them are wanna be Copas. Some may argue that a few models are better than Copa with the older Stadio, Brasil and Speciali being among them but lets face facts in 25 years the only changes have been slightly cosmetic like the added leather arch support, and the move away from the trifoil on the heel and tounge. Before boots became big business this is what most players wore along with Kings. Also aside from the mix sole and blacked out after market mods, have you ever seen a custom Copa??? Neither have I but I have seen Preds with no rubber, Preds with different outsoles than the retail version, AZT's with tounges, differetn outsole than what is sold, Puma V-1's with tounges and so on. Face facts this boot changed the football boot market forever in terms of quality and comfort in a positive way. As for the Preds, they are poorly made over rated junk. Yeah the pro's have nice ones that are custom fit and made in Germany but ours suck, they fall apart and more than half the shoe is plastic. Adidas was smart about bringing them out and sticking them on players that already could swerve and crush the ball like Becks and Koeman then saying it was the boots. They didn't make a revolution in the market, they changed the way boots were marketed to kids. Most adult players now were kids when these came out and got tricked into thinking that the boot helped them become better players. If anything this was the beginning of the end of overall quality in top of the line boots IMO. People stopped buying for comfort, fit, location of production and overall quality when these came out and started buying for having big fat chunks of rubber promising to make to kick 6% harder, which really only is like 1.5 mph and that is assuming that you are striking the ball proper (which many kids buying this boot don't). While the boot has become more stramlined it has changed the boot market in the worst way possible. It made people think boots make you better and distracted people from quality. Tunit- Please don't even get me started, this is the worst boot to be made in the last 5 years that is priced above $40.00 and isn't sporting a Fila logo. The concept is great considering its a half rip off of the Diadora Morpho and the Reebok Beleni. Adidas rushed this out to compete with the Vapor at WC time when they had a decent thing going with the normal F-50 in a lot of peoples eyes. They break, they are not comfy, the studs dont line up, they strip and everything else bad you can think of. They have just further taken people away from true quality. Mercurial/Vapor- They changed things but not for the better and also made synthetic boots able to be priced at more than $20.00. Nike almost had it perfect with the Mercurial 2 and the then the Match Mercurial when it came to a minimal sleek boot with nothing extra but the Vapor has done nothing but force other companies to over look their good boots in order to make crap knock off and gimmick things up even worse than they already have (see the Zhero Gravity). This shoe again has changed the market for the worse. It doesn't have a proper fit for most people yet they force their feet into them endure blisters and bone spurs all in the name of "speed" which they already had or didnt have before they bought the boot. Just like the Preds it made a revolution in a bad way and created quite a few morons that can't think for themselves along the way. AZT and previous Zoom models- I am mixed here, they were the first main stream high end wider fitting boot that lots of players wore starting with the GX and Rio series and came up through what is now the Laser. I have always been a fan and I have had every high end Air Zoom Nike boot model since the Air Rio 3 in 1997. I will get the Laser but I still think the rubberish fins are a gimmick but the wide fit suits me and the Zoom air provides some real comfort. I wouldn't say they are a revolution and they change with the times more than changing the times but they are good none the less. The thing that erks me though is their big features like no internal layers and so on isn't used in many of the pros boots who endorse them. I say just give us the goods they are using and if they did this would be the best line on the market. Puma King-This boot changed the idea of player sponsorship. When the cam flashed to Pele tying the laces of his Puma's in the 1970 final at the kick off (pre planned move BTW) the era of player marketing was born. I would say this boot is close to being on par with the Copa in terms of being classic but not quite the same lasting impact. This was the first top end boot to use different types of waterproof leather with some stuff from Pittards so it may have opened th door to goatskin, synthetic and other upper materials.
Well my sportssoccer don't carry them. When im in London next i might go and have a look in the Puma store see what they have to offer. Or i might just drag my friend into the big sports soccer! appleCORR
gotta luv JC, never misses a chance to rant against modern boots! Very good reasoning, but I wonder, 10 years down the road will cleats be more reminiscent of Copa's? Or Mercurials? Neanderthals came first, but cromagnions learned to talk.....
I don't ever remember seeing Becks in the Cica blades although I do remember the boots becuase my friend just came back from England with a copy of Total Football and some other mags with the ad for those boots in there. I remember Becks in Nike Tiempo's and also Asic Testimonials before the World Cups and Copa's led into the Predator Touch model for him.
He wore them at the very start of his career. I've got one of his videos and he's wearing them when he takes some free kicks against the presenter. appleCORR
I would love to say something positive about modern boots if they just made them better but the use of crap uppers and craftsmanship covered by slick ads and players in custom models totally different than what you and I can get under my skin. It rips me everytime I see a kid buy Vapors or Preds just because someone on TV is getting paid to wear them and they think that the skill is in the boot not their own feet. I own many modern boots and I always will because I try them out to see if they are worth it. More often than not I go back to a classic or semi classic design (Copa's, Nike Tiempo's). The only modern boots that have really done the job for me are the AZT line and really the 1's and 2's were the best with the 3's being awful and the 4's being good bar the crap insole, and the Rivaldo Wave Cups. All my Vapors, Preds, Cellerators, V-1's and F-50's have busted, been given away or sold at give away prices or ended up in the dust bin. I just see most modern boots as an excuse to use cheap material and sell at a massive price all while covering the cracks with fancy ads and players in custom look a like boots. When it comes down to it you can polish a turd but it is still a hunk of $hit.