There is a version of the away day that costs a fortune before you have left the house: the £85 replica shirt, the £70 club tracksuit top, the branded jacket, the official scarf. There is another version, worn by supporters who have been doing this for decades, that costs a fraction of that and works better on a wet Tuesday in Burnley. This is a guide to building a cheap football kit for the terraces: what actually needs to be worn to a match, what does not, and how to pay less for all of it without looking like you have.
How much prices have moved
A decade ago, the BBC’s annual Price of Football survey put the average cost of an adult Premier League replica shirt at just under £50. In the 2015 study the figure was £49.68 for adults and £33.66 for children. In 2026 ten clubs charge £80 or more and the most expensive is £90. Shirt prices have risen far faster than tickets, which are capped at £30 for away supporters, and far faster than wages. The supporter who used to buy a shirt a season now buys one every two or three, and the market for cheaper alternatives has grown to fill the gap.
What the away day actually requires
Strip it back and an away day needs four things: something in your colours, something warm, something waterproof, and something you can walk five miles in. Everything else is optional. The shirt is the only item that has to be club-specific, and even that is negotiable, because a scarf does the job of identification just as well and costs a tenth of the price. Nobody has ever been turned away from an away end for wearing a plain jumper.
The shirt underneath
If you want to wear the shirt, wear a cheap one. A fan-version replica from an independent retailer costs £20 to £30; last season’s official shirt is usually available at half price by September; a retro design is often cheaper still and never goes out of date. The current-season player-issue shirt, thin and slim and designed for someone running eleven kilometres, is the worst possible garment for standing still in the cold for two hours. Buy for the terrace, not the pitch, and buy a size up so it fits over a hoodie in winter.
Layers over it
The rest of the outfit is where the real saving is. A plain black or navy hoodie, a waterproof shell from an outdoor shop rather than a sports brand, and a decent pair of trainers will see you through a whole season and will not mark you out in a pub. Club-branded jackets and tracksuit tops are sold at a premium that has nothing to do with their quality, and a £120 club rain jacket is, in almost every case, a £40 jacket with a badge. Spend the difference on the train.
Colours and where you are sitting
One rule that money cannot buy your way around: do not wear the home team’s colours in the away end, or your own colours in a home area you have been forced into by ticket shortages. Stewards will move you and your own supporters will not forgive you. If you are going to a ground where you have been allocated seats among home fans, wear neutral layers and keep the shirt underneath. It is not cowardice; it is how you get to see the match.
Weather
English away days run from August heat to February sleet, and the cheap kit that works is the one that adapts. A shirt alone in August, shirt and hoodie in October, shirt, hoodie and shell from November, and a hat and gloves for the January trip to the north-east. None of it needs to be club-branded; all of it needs to be dry. Uncovered away ends, and there are still a few, are where a waterproof earns its money.
Kids
Children’s replica shirts are zero-rated for VAT and have still risen by up to 25 per cent at some clubs this year, which is an argument for buying them in the sale. Last season’s junior shirt, bought in August for half price, will fit for a season and be outgrown regardless of the design on it. A child in a two-year-old shirt is a child in a shirt; nobody else in the away end is checking the sponsor.
The checklist
Before the season: one cheap shirt, one plain hoodie, one waterproof shell, one pair of trainers, one scarf. Total, if you shop sensibly, well under a hundred pounds, or roughly the price of a single player-issue shirt from the club shop. That kit will do twenty away days. The club-shop version would do the same twenty days and leave you two hundred pounds worse off for the privilege of a logo on a jacket that nobody looks at.
Scarves, hats and the rest
A scarf is the most cost-effective item of football clothing there is: it identifies you at fifty yards, it keeps you warm, it costs a fraction of a shirt and it lasts for decades. Independent sellers outside every ground sell them for a few pounds, and the old bar scarves in club colours, without a crest, are cheaper still and often better made. Hats and gloves follow the same logic. None of it needs a badge.
The second-hand market
Charity shops in football cities are full of shirts, and the online resale sites are fuller. A previous-season official shirt in good condition sells second-hand for a third of its original price; a ten-year-old design, faded sponsor and all, for less than a pint. The retro market has made old shirts respectable, and a supporter in a 2010 away kit is now making a statement rather than an economy. Check the seams and the print, wash it before wearing, and treat a sponsor from a defunct company as a feature.
What to leave at home
The club tracksuit top, unless it was a present. The player-issue shirt, which will be cold and tight. The white trainers, which will be brown by half-time in December. Anything you would be upset to lose, because away ends are crowded and things get spilled. And the new shirt on its first outing: nobody wants the season’s first beer thrown over a design that cost eighty-five pounds that morning.
The point
The away day is the train, the pub, the ground and the ninety minutes. The kit is what you wear to get there, and the supporters who have been doing this longest are the ones in the oldest shirts and the plainest jackets, because they learned a long time ago where the money is better spent. For more on grounds, travel and how to do the away day properly, explore Away Day Planner.