Norwich

Without wishing to sound snobbish (not much anyway), the mainstream media don't 'do' football kits well, it's all a bit lazy. Take, for example, the way that Coventry City's brown away kit from the 1970s is unthinkingly thrown into every single 'worst kits' feature - seriously, we can't see much wrong with it - or how anything with pink in it is still treated with a strong element of suspicion.

Therefore, it wasn't too much of a surprise to see that nuance didn't feature too much in the analysis of Norwich City's three new kits last summer. We're not just being contrary for the sake of it by saying that we think they work, by and large, and we've decided to try to prove it.

In the interests of full disclosure, we'll start by saying that the Premier League appear to have broken one of their own rules by allowing Norwich have the three kits above. The PL handbook states that at least one of a club's change kits should be different enough from the home kit that it could be worn against it and it's arguable that Norwich don't achieve this. Then again, this was allowed in 2013, so it's not as if they're always on top of things kit-wise.

The reality is that all you have to worry about with your change kit is that they solve clashes with other teams. A few years ago, Newcastle United had an all-black away kit which wouldn't have worked if the first team played the reserves but it was more than adequate for away games against teams in white or stripes.

By contrast, in the 2007 eircom League, Bray Wanderers had a white away shirt with green shorts - not ideal when their only two clashes were Cork City (who were in stripes that season) and Shamrock Rovers. Because of league rules which forced the home side to change if a ref felt that kits might be problematic, Rovers wore black when hosting Bray. When the Seagulls came to Turner's Cross in August, City were asked to change but refused and so the visitors donned the hosts' away kit (City received a €1,000 fine for their troubles).

While we accept that another colour might be needed if Norwich were in Europe and played Nantes, we believe that what they have is sufficient. Let's look at the instances where they would need to change (as opposed to those games where alternative kits are worn simply to get people to buy them):

The only other side in the Premier League to feature yellow in any prominent fashion are Watford, whom Norwich visit on December 5. The Hornets have a lot of black this season but Norwich's green away ensures no confusion (left) - the green home shorts can be used to make things even more clear-cut (right).

The green strip will suffice against any of the other teams in the league with a yellowish tint, but of course the home is a halved effort this year so Norwich clash with teams in green too.

Realistically, the only two examples of that are League 2 sides Plymouth Argyle and Yeovil Town. Plymouth are already out of the FA Cup, but we had these kits drawn anyway. The third shirt up against Plymouth's home is fine, in our view (left). There is a shorts clash, but that's easily alleviated if the away shorts are used (right).

Yeovil are still in the cup and might be third-round opponents, but they have no black on their kit and so the third kit has enough differentiation, given two-thirds ratio of yellow/gold to green (below and below left). And if you don't agree with us, take it up with the Football League, who allowed Yeovil to register a yellow and green away kit, which will presumably be worn away to Plymouth on Boxing Day (below right).