Peter Saville, one of the best-known graphic designers in the UK has been chosen to design the new England football shirts for Umbro. Saville is best known for his album covers for Factory Records in the 1980’s and 90’s including the iconic Joy Division and New Order catalogues. He more recently has held lucrative consultancies for Givenchy, Pringle and Selfridges and is noted for re-branded the Design Museum and the Whitechapel Galleries. The team unveiled them on their Euro 2012 qualifying match on Friday against Bulgaria. Saville’s brief was to include colour on the shirt whilst keeping the shirt white. His contribution has been to sew tiny crosses in different colours on the shoulder area of the garment. Feedback has been mixed from the fans that have been quite vocal on the subject describing, Saville’s graphics as resembling confetti, hundreds and thousands and a particularly exotic strain of dandruff. The football shirt is a vehicle for ‘socio-cultural provocation’ When Umbro invited Peter Saville to contribute to the design of its new England home kit; it was always likely that there would be more on the agenda than a few stripes. Our verdict is a thumbs up.***