This might look like a regular football shirt, but what makes it a world first?
This Newcastle United jersey was first unveiled in during the 2023-24 campaign, and were subsequently used during the Magpies’ 4-0 Premier League victory over Tottenham Hotspur.
It has all the trappings of the regular kit – the same manufacturer, the traditional club badge, the Sela sponsor and all of the usual trimmings – but it also incorporates some fascinating technology, aimed to improve the match-going experience of football fans.
The shirt is fitted with a number of microphones and sensors that react in tandem with the noise of the stadium, converting that audio into touch sensations that can be felt by the shirt’s wearer.
This cutting-edge technology, used for the very first time in football, allowed deaf supporters to quite literally feel the raucous atmosphere at St James’ Park.
How does it work? The sounds around the ground are picked up by microphones positioned around the stadium and converted in real time into digital audio. That data is then transferred to the shirt’s “electronic brain”, which disseminates that information to tiny motors built into the shirt. Those motors vibrate in response to the crowd, providing blink-of-the-eye haptic feedback to the supporter.
Thanks to the partnership between the RNID and club sponsor Sela, supporters could experience Blaydon Races, Geordie Boot Boys, and that roar when the players first emerge from the tunnel to the tune of Local Hero.
For the Spurs fixture, the RNID logo featured prominently on the shirt as part of the club’s Unsilence the Crowd campaign. With one in five adults in the UK experiencing hearing loss, the move made a key aspect of the game more accessible for members of the Toon Army.
The shirt is proudly on display as part of Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Goals, featuring in our Score Gallery until November.