Girondins de Bordeaux

This was one of the most unusual shirts in Girondins de Bordeaux history. Made by Asics for the 1995/96 season, the shirt replaced Bordeaux's traditional navy-and-white identity with a bold Bordeaux-red base and thin blue vertical stripes. Most strikingly, it abandoned the club's iconic scapular, a design element that had become almost synonymous with the Girondins.

The name across the chest was just as distinctive: Alain Afflelou. The French businessman was not simply the club's sponsor; he was also Bordeaux's president at the time, making the shirt an unusual intersection of football, ownership and commercial identity.

Alain Afflelou was more than a businessman. He was one of France's most recognizable entrepreneurs, turning his own name and personality into the face of a hugely successful optical brand through some of the country's most memorable advertising campaigns.

A Bordeaux native by business history, Afflelou opened his first optical store in the Bordeaux area in 1972. He later became president of the Girondins, leading the club from 1990 to 1996. By the time his name appeared across the chest of the 1995/96 shirt, Afflelou was both the club's president and one of France's most recognizable business personalities.

And then the shirt became part of one of the greatest European stories in the club's history. Bordeaux had started the European campaign in the Intertoto Cup, eventually progressing all the way to the UEFA Cup final. Along the way came the famous comeback against AC Milan, a 3–0 victory at Parc Lescure after losing the first leg 2–0. The team featured players such as Zinédine Zidane, Christophe Dugarry and Bixente Lizarazu.

Bordeaux ultimately lost the final to Bayern Munich 5–1 on aggregate, but the improbable European run transformed the shirt into a piece of club history.

Today, the Afflelou shirt is remembered not because it looked like a classic Bordeaux shirt, but because it didn't. It captured a brief moment when the club's visual identity, commercial ambitions and European adventure all collided. A strange shirt. A legendary season. A very Bordeaux piece of football history.