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Chris Wright, Toe Poke writer
Venezia literally kicked off their season in style on Sunday by taking to the pitch wearing their new home kit for the 2024-25 campaign, which is designed by Nocta — the Nike offshoot co-created and fronted by rap superstar Drake.
Drake was confirmed to have become an investor in the newly promoted Serie A club after joining the ranks at global sports-focused firm APEX Capital. It was also announced that the Canadian rapper would be sponsoring the club’s 2024-25 kits via Nocta.
After a whirlwind week at boardroom level, Venezia began their league campaign against Lazio in Rome on Sunday night in a 3-1 loss and surprised fans by doing so in their new Drake-sponsored strip before the release of any official images or launch material.
Shortly after news of Drake’s involvement broke, Nocta formally took over as Venezia’s official kit provider last week after a deal was agreed between the two parties.
The club had previously had their kits supplied by Kappa, which took the reins in 2021 and proceeded to transform the Winged Lions into one of the most stylish clubs in European football via a string of achingly chic ensembles created in collaboration with New York-based graphic design studio Bureau Borsche. Venezia then further sealed their haute couture credentials by launching their kits with high-fashion photoshoots staged against some of Venice’s most glamourous vistas: from historic canals, cathedrals and bridges to the idyllic lagoons that surround the ancient city.
However, Venezia’s highly productive deal with Kappa came to an end over the summer, which left the club preparing for life in Italy’s top flight by playing friendlies in plain, unbranded, unsponsored kits.
When the new Nocta deal was green-lit, the Nike sub-brand hastily applied its three-pronged logo to those same generic kits in time for Venezia’s Coppa Italia tie against Brescia, thus creating a white “special edition” strip of sorts while it continued to put the finishing touches to Venezia’s new 2024-25 range.
With any official launch yet to take place, Venezia came out of the tunnel at the Stadio Olimpico wearing their new Nocta home strip, thus revealing it to the watching world for the first time.
As can be seen, the shirt retains Venezia’s traditional club colours of black, green and orange, while the main body also features a faint rounded diamond graphic (which very much looks like it has been taken from Nocta’s “trident” marque). The graphic is also unusual in that it appears to extend only halfway down the torso.
A simple, black button-up collar replaces last year’s gold version, and orange and green are used to provide the trim — including a two-tone cuff and side panels that extend from beneath the arm to the lower hem.
It’s certainly easy on the eye in its own right, but how does Venezia’s new 2024-25 Nocta home kit rank once compared to the best that Kappa had to offer the club? We’ll happily let you be the judges on that score.
