Barbados

 Away (unknown year); Locust.

99p is all this cost. It will be hard to top that in terms of bargains in this search for shirts.  Add in the rarity of them, and it becomes an even bigger result. I couldn’t believe my luck when I saw it going that cheap as the hours and minutes ticked down on Ebay so took a shot and won.   Now the one thing about this shirt over other Locust ones which have sold for much more is that a picture of the team wearing it has so far been impossible to source.  My fellow collector, Joe, has the home version of this and has also been unable to find a picture.  I have discussed the shirts with him and we’re both happy that they are genuine Locust products, and are genuine Barbados FA approved also.   Locust even lists it on their website as the official Barbados shirt and they were on sale in stores there.  It is not unheard of to not be able to unearth pictures of some of the rarer shirts. In this case, there aren’t many pictures of the team playing, never mind the shirt itself in action. 

Anyway, moving on, this is a real gem of a shirt.  The colours are vibrant and the quality of the shirt is excellent.  No sublimation or screen printing, all embroidered logos and the eye-for-detail on the stitching is good.  These are the things that the smaller companies often get wrong, but not Locust to be fair to them.  While I had never heard of them until recently, they have actually carved out something of a niche for themselves in Caribbean football, making some of the other international shirts in the area.

The Bajan Pride, as the team is nicknamed, have very little to cheer about on the international stage.  They have never reached a major tournament and shock results are really their high point.  Wikipedia lists wins over Costa Rica (2-1) and a 1-1 draw with Northern Ireland as notable results, but they are almost ten years ago now.  Since then, wins against any nation have been hard to come by.  One-goal wins over Aruba and Dominica respectively being the highlight of their last ten or so games.  That said, with a population of just over 200,000 people, it would be unfair to call them underachievers either.  There are just 15,000 registered players there across all grades and including both sexes.   FIFA currently ranks them above Liechtenstein, but for me that just proves the absurdity of the ranking system. 

While the two results mentioned above are famous in their own right in Barbados, one Bajan result from 1994 has since become infamous across the globe in international football.  It took place at the Caribbean Cup, where the first round featured a number of 3-team groups, out of which the top placed team progressed.  Unlike most league formats, draws weren’t deemed to be an acceptable finish, so any games ending tied would go to extra time.  But that is where the real silliness began.  The extra-time was Golden Goal, but for some bizarre reason, the winning goal would count double in the group’s “goals for” standings.  Going into their final game against Grenada, who were top on three points and a goal better off in the Goal Difference, Barbados found themselves bottom with no points.  Puerto Rica were also on 3 points having beaten Grenada, but were out of contention no matter what the result was. To advance, Barbados would need to win by two clear goals. 

Barbados set about their task, and indeed went two goals ahead, enough to see them through.  But then Grenada scored and suddenly it was them who were back top of the group.  The Bajan Pride went on the attack once more but couldn’t break down the Grenada defence.  Then, in a moment of underhanded genius, Barbados deliberately scored an own goal to get themselves into extra time where they could attempt to score the double goal.

Now the game was at 2–2, with just three minutes of normal time left. The Grenadian players caught on to Barbados's plan, and realized that they would advance in the tournament by scoring a goal in either net. This left the match in the highly unusual position of no clear side of the field for one team versus the other, but rather one team trying to score a goal in either net, and the other team trying to defend both. For the next three minutes, Barbadian players successfully defended both sides. Still tied at 2−2, the game went on to extra-time, where the winning "Golden Goal" would count double — so Barbados only had to score once to qualify for the 1994 Caribbean Cup. Thorne scored the winner for Barbados and they advanced to the next round

Watch the famous own goal here and subsequent winning goal here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ThpYsN-4p7w