The Men in Blue .....

From plain white coloured pants and buttoned shirts to honour the Gentlemen's game to the designer sports wear from the biggest sports apparel manufacturers of the world, this has been the journey of the dress that our Indian cricket team wears on the field.  Ever since the advent of the white ball and day night cricket it is always the colour of the jersey worn by cricketers that spectators from around the worl have got used to identify their favorite teams and players . While it was traditionally yellow for the Aussies, it was always green for Pakistan, black for the Kiwis, Maroon for the Windies and for some reason the Indian team got used to be called the Men in Blue. 

My earliest memory of the Men in Blue was from the 1985 Benson and Hedges trophy in Australia, I vividly recall a tall and lanky Ravi Shastri in his light blue T shirt and blue pants opening the innings and winning the coveted champion of champions title and an Audi car. Over the next few years the light blue was the standard jersey colour until it changed in the 1992 world cup when the team started using the dark blue  jersey , I found it strange that this T shirt also had a red and green strip on it , not really sure of the significance of these two colours. It is quite normal to have the colours of the flag of the country but this combination all though it looked good didnt have any significant reason for it to be present on the T shirt. Over the next few years as the sponsors of Team India changed so did the design of the Tshirt, from simple collared Tees to Tees with buttoned collars to open collared Tees.

The Tri colour was now common on almost all designs after the 1999 world cup which probably was the last Tee with a light blue and yellow combination.As the years passed with improvement in fabric the Tees were now made from the latest synthetic materials which we now call as the Dry Fit Tees.The last couple of years has seen a completely new shade of blue which is quite different from the light and dark blues that have been tried earlier and I find this most appealing, thanks to the efforts of the various hi profile designers who have worked with BCCI to make this not only eye catching but also very trendy. The tri colour also been juxtaposed well with the team name and logo of BCCI. 

It wouldnt be unfair to say that just as the design of the Tees have evolved so has the fortunes of the Indian cricket team over the last 2-3 decades.