Football shirt facts #3 - Carlos Navarro Montoya and his bizarre shirts
Boca Juniors goalkeeper Carlos Navarro Montoya became famous in the 90s for wearing unusual goalkeeper shirts, which he himself was the author of.
The 90s in football fashion brought us a revolution in goalkeepers' clothing. Manufacturers of sports equipment outdid each other in more and more interesting designs, and often it was the goalkeepers themselves who came up with the initiative and design of their field clothing.
One of the goalkeepers who took matters into their own hands and made their mark in the history of shirt fashion was the Colombian Carlos Navarro Montoya, the holder of a rather specific nickname - "El Mono", meaning the monkey.
Montoya spent best period of his career with Argentina's Boca Juniors Buenos Aires, where he joined in 1988. He spent 8 years at the club from the La Bombonera stadium and played as many as 396 official matches in its colors. He made Boca history by setting two records. For most games played in a row (180 games) and minutes without conceding a goal (824 minutes)
It was while playing for Boca Juniors that the goalkeeper came up with the idea of wearing unusual shirts during matches. Montoya appeared in jerseys with the motif of a truck that he drives himself, and the vehicle registration consists of the letters "CFNM", which is an abbreviation for Carlos Fernando Navarro Montoya. On the back of the shirt at the height of the number was the back of the truck. The whole set was complemented by shorts, one half of which was blue and the other half full of various colorful motifs. His unusual "outfit" aroused great interest of fans in the 90s.
However, Montoya was not as original in his idea as it might seem. The history of the truck as a goalkeeper jersey motif began a few years earlier in Germany. The pioneer of this idea was goalkeeper Jörg Schmadtke, who was the first to wear a shirt with a comic truck in the colors of Fortuna Düsseldorf. It can be said that the Colombian slightly modified Schmadtke's design and gave it a second life, thus commemorating the original idea of the German from a few years ago.
The story of goalkeeper jerseys with vehicles in the lead role does not end there. The continuation of this tradition, started by Schmadtke in Düsseldorf, was the Brazilian Rogerio Ceni. Schmadtke and Montoyi's younger colleague went a step further and introduced even crazier graphic designs on his shirts. Rogerio Ceni featured on his jerseys driving a monster truck, a locomotive, or piloting a plane that flies over the Pacaembu stadium in Sao Paulo, from which balls are dropped. I have to admit that some of the Sao Paulo goalkeeper's ideas were really great and are extremely desirable copies among football shirt collectors around the world. Here are some examples of Rogerio Ceni's unique sweatshirts:
Credits photo:
- https://www.n-tv.de/sport/fussball/Ein-Typ-so-schillernd-wie-seine-Trikots-article23887801.html
- https://www.kodromagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/CnWeL0VXYAI9IIJ.jpg
- https://terceirotempo.uol.com.br/imagens/19/01/pdt_ft1_121901.JPg
- https://img.r7.com/images/2015/09/08/3gtr3ypoge_7j3zwb0aux_file?dimensions=771×420&no_crop=true
- https://static.wixstatic.com/media/aefc75_52c6e9bd5c8640c791eab7fd2a948e6b.jpg/v1/fill/w_250,h_267,al_c,q_90,enc_auto/aefc75_52c6e9bd5c8640c791eab7fd2a948e6b.jpg
