Written by Mike Carter, Hull KR Shirts.
On Thursday, 26th October, with the help of Hull KR Shirts, Hull KR launched their first of two alternate kits for the 2024 Betfred Super League season. The marble inspired kit was modelled by Dean Hadley, James Batchelor, Jez Litten, and Young Player of the Year, Louix Gorman.
As always, I will start this short story at the beginning. At 09:00 AM, the social media channels of Hull KR shared an image of a marble tablet, with the sleeve of the new shirt overlapping one of the corners. The tablet had called the West Stand reception home for many years, before recently being relocated into the Chairman’s Suite of Sewell Group Craven Park.
A week ago, I was tasked with writing a preview for the kit, in a similar style to this one, whilst keeping the full identity of the kit a secret. If you haven’t read that, you can read that here. The reaction was overwhelming and far superior to anything that I had imagined. Over 4000 people have read the article since it was published, making it the most viewed article I have ever produced.
Next up, we had the final teaser post from the clubs’ principal partner, Connexin. That came at 12PM and featured a CAD (computer-aided design) image of the front of the shirt, which showed the Connexin logo in pale blue on a marble effect background, that represents the front of the new 2024 marble alternate shirt.
Let’s get this review started…
Naturally, with the Club having so much white on the home kit for 2024, it was inevitable that at least one of the alternate kits would be a dark colour, and that is what we have here. The first alternate kit for the 2024 season is a mostly navy affair with pale blue detailing to the cuffs, crest and sponsors. Within the front panel of the shirt is a marble-like effect that is best visible when close up or under the correct lighting. Oxen used a very similar dye sublimation technique on the 2020 away shirt to produce a marl-effect. That worked brilliantly as a design element, and once again, this marble style variation does too.
It will bring a brilliant contrast on the field for the Robins, with potential appearances at the likes of Salford, St Helens and Wigan as well as providing a better option for those parents who absolutely hate washing their little ones white rugby shirts…
Every sponsor on the kit features in pale blue, without any exceptions. I say it multiple times year-after-year, but every single one of these partners deserves to be thanked for their consideration of our kit design. Without their support, they would never look anywhere near as good as they do!
Principal partner Connexin is once again the front of shirt sponsor as it will be for at least the next two seasons. Their branding fits nicely on the shirt, without being restricted by the design. I noted in my 2024 home shirt review that the sponsor looked a bit big. This was likely due to it being contained within a band. With the design element being a secondary one, this doesn’t cause any concern on the marble alternate shirt, in my opinion.
The front of the shirt sees AC Enviro in their usual upper alternate kit chest spot. Aspire Academy’s logo is on the right of the chest (as wearing), and from a visual perspective, it is applied much better on the 2024 shirts than it was on the 2023 versions. The branding has been inverted on the shirt, allowing for the shirt to show through the main body of the embroidered logo. In 2024, it doesn’t look as ‘blocky’ as it did on the 2023 shirts. Inverting this was a great move. It doesn’t affect the quality of the branding, and the shirt looks better. A win/win in my book!
Both Richardson’s Food and Safety Consulting Ltd and the University of Hull both feature again as sleeve sponsors. RFS has moved from the left sleeve to the right, and UoH has moved up slightly but remains on the left sleeve. I suspect we shall see a heat applied sponsor logo in the space under the UoH logo on the playing shirts for the 2024 season.
Where is Super League competition logo?
Although I covered this on the 2024 home kit review, I shall expand on this again, with a little bit more detail Something that is conspicuous by its absence is the Super League branding that appeared on all three shirt releases in 2023. We’ve spoken about the cycle being broken in terms of league position and the threat of relegation, meaning that it hasn’t always been possible to include this within a design for dye sublimation. That hasn’t been the case in 2023, so it could have been included, so why hasn’t it? My opinion on this is that when the shirt went into production, it may not have been known which company was sponsoring the competition in 2024, baring in mind the shirt goes into production months ahead of its release. It is very much possible that it still might not be known to clubs who will sponsor the competition in 2024 and beyond.
What might interest some supporters is that cross-city rivals Hull FC have included the Betfred Super League competition patches on their replica shirts for 2024. This would indicate to me that either A; they knew something that no other club did at their time of manufacturing, or B; they’ve got incredibly lucky that the competitions’ partner has stayed the same. Either way, I find the subject quite fascinating.
What about the back?
On the back of the shirt, we find Harrison Solway and Hirebase’s branding in pale blue, in uniform with the rest of the sponsors. Above the Harrison Solway branding is the Robin Icon in the same place as it was during the 2023 season.
It is believed that in 2024, there will be a new font and number style for name and number printing. Hopefully, with this we shall see more colour options available for clubs to use on their kits. Names and numbers applied in white would work on the marble alternate kit, but it wouldn’t be the most aesthetically pleasing. Now, imagine them being applied in a similar pale blue to that used across the kit. YES, PLEASE!
The brand partners that appear across the shorts are Steve Leaming Plant, ESM and Instamod. All of these feature on the 2024 home kit shorts, too. The marble-design isn’t exclusive to the front of the shirt, as it can be seen on the side panel of the shorts, too. A position that Oxen and Hull KR have used many times over the years to continue the design of a shirt onto the shorts.
“My blood will forever, run through the stone”
Those who use Instagram may have noticed the addition of a song to the release images on the official Hull KR account’s story. A section of the song, The Angel (North London Forever), performed by Louis Dunford, was included. The lyrics for the section of the song used are as follows “My blood will forever, run through the stone.” Unwittingly, this song could have played its part in influencing the design of the kit, somewhere along the line. It’s known to me that someone at the club is a fan of Louis and has been listening to his music for some time now. Enough so that it was used on social media as part of the revealing of the kit. The line about blood running through stone could quite easily be linked to the marble effect and our club.
Some supporters had their shirts delivered hyperfast by Rufus the Robin and the team at Connexin, as a thank you for pre-ordering the shirt ahead of its full reveal. Charlie Webster, Kai Dunn and other Robin’ supporters had the pleasure of a surprise visitor to drop off their latest purchases!
I mentioned in my exclusive preview of the 2024 marble alternate kit that I think the kit is clean and stylish. I’m sure that you’ll be able to see where I am coming from with that now that the full reveal has taken place. Naturally, the first thing I try and do with a kit is pick a fault in. I study it, find its weaknesses, and build positives around that whilst I am formulating my opinion. When I saw the kit for the first time, I fell silent for a moment. To the point where I’m sure the people at the club thought, “He doesn’t like it.” The reason for the silence was whilst I tried to find a fault, but in that immediate moment, I failed to do so. It isn’t the best alternate kit that we’ve had, in my opinion, but I will go on record as saying that I don’t believe that too many people will hate this kit, either. It is a naturally likeable modern design with two colours that support each other well. I can see it being very popular and one that I am happy to add to my collection!
That leaves us with one kit yet to be revealed for 2024. We have a traditional home kit and a relatively basic alternate kit. Does that mean we’re going to get something whacky and out-there for the second alternate kit? I really hope so!!
The 2024 marble alternate kit can be purchased by clicking here. The kit is available for immediate dispatch and can also be purchased from the Hull KR store at Sewell Group Craven Park.
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