From Pink to Power: How Notts County Gave Juventus Their Stripes

Before Juventus became the Old Lady draped in dominance, before Platini’s elegance or Zidane’s vision, before the ruthless years of Lippi and Allegri, they were just another local Turin side, wearing pink. Yes, pink.

Juventus were founded in 1897 by a group of teenage students. The club’s first colours were a far cry from the bianconeri that now define them. They wore pale pink shirts with a black tie - gentlemanly, eccentric, oddly delicate. But the shirts, it turned out, were poorly made. The colour faded in the wash. They were left with what one report described as “a dirty white.” By 1903, they needed something new.

Enter John Savage - an Englishman, living in Turin, playing for Juventus, and still in correspondence with friends back home in Nottingham. When the club asked him to sort out a fresh batch of kits, Savage got in touch with a mate back in England. That mate just so happened to be a Notts County supporter.

Now, Notts County weren’t just any club. They were the oldest professional football club in the world, founded in 1862. Their look? Bold black and white stripes, a nod to authority, to tradition, and, as it turns out, to what would become the most successful club in Italian football history. The kit supplier didn’t mess about, they shipped a set of Notts County shirts over to Turin.

The players pulled them on. Gone was the pale, unsteady pink. In its place: stark contrast, monochrome menace. And Juventus never looked back.

There’s a kind of poetry in it, a club born from a teenage schoolboy rebellion, finding its identity in the colours of a gritty English side from the East Midlands. It wasn’t romanticism that made Juve great, but grit and reinvention. Their new look wasn’t designed by a brand strategist. It came via a mate’s favour and a box in the post.

Over a century later, the link lives on. In 2011, Juventus invited Notts County to open their brand new Juventus Stadium. A pre-season friendly, yes - but one brimming with symbolism. The match ended 1-1, a shared scoreline between brothers-in-stripes.

Today, Juve’s colours are iconic - synonymous with Italian control, defensive mastery, tactical sharpness. But behind the legend lies a story of washed-out pink, Nottingham mail orders, and a shirt that became the bedrock of a football empire.

The irony? Notts County now play in the National League, miles away from the Champions League nights that Juventus have made their home. But every time Juve step onto the pitch, every time they pull on those shirts, a bit of Meadow Lane steps with them, stitched into the seams of calcio history.