The Story of a Goalkeeper's Best Friend

Most people will be surprised to see a goalkeeper who does not wear gloves these days because we're used to seeing It as part of the game, and goalkeepers consider it a piece of basic equipment they can't play without. But before gloves, goalkeepers played the game and made saves with their bare hands.

Some people may think that the history of goalkeeper gloves began in 1885 when William Sykes obtained a patent for a pair of "leather gloves or football gloves," but the weird thing Is that it didn't appear until more than 55 years later. It is stated that Amadeo Carrizo, known as "Tarzan of Argentina," was the first goalkeeper to wear gloves while playing for River Plate In the 1940s, and his Wikipedia page firmly confirms this as a fact.

And it should be mentioned that one of the most contentious subjects to this day Is who the first goalkeeper to wear gloves was.

In general, many goalkeepers used gloves before 1970, although this was due to poor weather conditions in addition to a lack of specialized goalkeeper gloves makers.

By the 1970s, gloves were becoming more and more popular, which increased demand for the products and induced glove-making companies such as Stanno, Reusch, Uhlsport, and Sondico to begin producing gloves In large quantities, However, the design of the gloves at the time was quite simple, but It did the job, which was to protect the goalkeepers' hands from Injury and to assist them to handle the ball.

Many notable goalkeepers wore gloves in the 1970s, including English Gordon Banks, who was famous for wearing one of the first pairs specially made for goalkeepers at the 1970 World Cup in Mexico, and German goalkeeper icon Sepp Maier. During the 1974 World Cup, he was the first goalkeeper to wear gloves (large size) manufactured by Reusch. As reported by the Telegraph

By the end of the 1980s, It was unusual to see a goalkeeper on the field without gloves, and the last goalkeeper that did so In the Premier League was the Bolton Wanderers goalkeeper in the Frigate Rover Cup Final at Wembley in 1986.