How Clubs Got Their Colours: Athletic Club de Bilbao

Athletic Club de Bilbao is famously Basque and known throughout the world for its red-and-white striped shirts and black shorts. But where did they get those colours? The answer lies in England…

Basque football team Athletic Club de Bilbao is a little like Yorkshire County Cricket Club used to be; to play for the team you had to be born in the region.

In the case of the Basque Country, this includes either side of the Pyrenees, hence French international Bixente Lizarazu’s 16 games with the club in the 1990s.

This fiercely patriotic club was actually founded – like many football clubs in Spain – by British industrialists. 

As a major port on the north coast of Iberia, Bilbao very much mirrors Southampton in England, geographically as well as in industry and importance. The two cities’ football clubs also play in red-and-white stripes and black shorts. This is not a coincidence. [Continues]

Athletic Club’s original strip was white, then blue-and-white halves before 1909, when Bilbao student Juan Elorduy picked up 50 shirts in Southampton when catching the ship home. The colours are the same as the City of Bilbao’s flag. The club started using its now-familiar colours in 1910.

Interestingly, surplus shirts from Elorduy’s haul were sent to Athletic’s Madrid youth brand – the future Atlético de Madrid – so Southampton FC has inadvertently left its mark twice on La Liga.

Interesting factoid: Along with Real Madrid and FC Barcelona, Athletic Bilbao is the only team never to have been relegated from the top flight in Spain.

If you’re interested in early Spanish football, make sure you read my book Origin Stories: The Pioneers Who Took Football to the World.