The Half-Time Shirt Swap in Soccer

2019-06-26
Soccer

Half time shirt swap? Half time jersey exchange? This is new, right? I don’t think I’ve seen the half-time jersey swap in soccer….You know you’ve really made it to an elite level of as a soccer player when other players want to swap jerseys with you at half-time of the game, not after.

Yes, everyone wants Sadio Mane’s jersey. And if you have to get Sane’s jersey at halftime you get it at halftime.

The halftime jersey exchange is probably not that big of deal if it’s a friendly match or if your team is ahead by a wide a lot of goals. And if a player is nearing the end of his career, it’s probably understandable for a lot of players to want their jersey. Imagine when Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo are nearing retirement, everyone is going to want the jersey at the start of the game in the tunnel!

We’ve seen players swapping jerseys a million times before but never at halftime of a game. But Chelsea manager Gus Hiddink says it is wrong to swap shirts at half time, after Eden Hazard angers Chelsea fans by swapping with Angel Di Maria as the Blues lose to PSG in the Champions League.


While the actually jersey exchange between England’s Alex Oxlade Chamberlin and Brazil’s Neymar wasn’t made at the half, it was arranged during the actual game. Can you blame him though, he got Neymar’s jersey after all. Is the half time shirt swap going to become a trend in world football…

Arsenal’s Andre Santos wants Robin Van Persie’s Manchester United shirt so badly he ask for it at the half and right in the face of his manager, Arsene Wenger, who had just traded Van Persie to Manchester United.

Chelsea’s Samuel Eto’o and Liverpool’s Mamadou Sakho swap shirts at half-time. But then Eto’o went on to score the game winner by beating central defender Sakho to the ball as Chelsea beat Liverpool 2-1. Liverpool manager Brenden Rogers wasn’t too happy to hear about the half-time shirt swap. I almost wonder if it was a ploy by Chelsea’s Jose Mourinho, telling Eto’o to swap shirts to get inside Sakho’s head.

And finally, at least the Raja Casablanca players waited until the end of the game to strip Ronaldinho of his football jersey and his soccer shoes! This was during the FIFA Club World Cup in 2013. Again, can you blame these professional soccer players from wanting a piece of Ronaldinho’s gear….? I don’t think so.

New Sergej Milinković-Savić and Gerard Deulofeu exchange jerseys at half time.