Saracens and Sale Sharks will both be wearing their away strips in Saturday’s Premiership final to avoid a clash that would impact some colour-blind spectators.
Why are Saracens and Sale Sharks wearing their away kits?
There are reckoned to be one in 12 men and one in 200 women in the UK with problems caused by colour vision deficiency (CVD).
And as exclusively revealed by i earlier this month, the Premiership have pledged to play their part in ending the frustration for colour-blind fans of rugby union.
Amid calls to avoid clashes in the World Cup later this year as well, Saturday’s showpiece will see both sides wear an “away” kit.
Saracens could have chosen their home kit of all black given they were the number-one seeds heading into the match at Twickenham, which kicks off at 3pm on Saturday, but the club have agreed to turn out in white instead.
That is because Saracens’ black kit would have led to a colour-blind clash with both of Sale’s strips – the dark-blue home version, and the dark maroon-red of the away one.
Sale will therefore wear their maroon-red away kit in opposition to the white of Saracens, with organisers rejecting a match-up of white versus blue as being too much in Sale’s favour.
Ollie Lewis, the Premiership’s head of broadcast and fixtures, told i: “The key point is we are taking this seriously; it is not just a show for the final.
“We are intent on not having clashes next season. The biggest complaints we had this season were when Saracens in black played Sale in maroon at the StoneX [in October].
“When Sale first brought their maroon-red kit in, the colour-blind issue wasn’t really on our radar, but we have been working to understand it with [campaign group] Colour Blind Awareness. We have tweaked the regulations for next season, so we could tell a club to wear their away kit at home.
“We have looked at each match-up. Some people think it is just a problem with red and green, but there are many forms of CVD.”
As explained in greater detail below, the Saracens home kit would have clashed Sale’s maroon kit for “protanopes”, who are more likely to confuse black with many shades of red.
Types of colour blindness explained
The Colour Blindness Awareness website goes into great detail about the types of colour blindness and explaining the differences. Below is an excerpt from their site explaining the difficulties those with colour blindness may face:
Protanopes are more likely to confuse:
- Black with many shades of red
- Dark brown with dark green, dark orange, dark red, dark blue/purple and black
- Some blues with some reds, purples and dark pinks
- Mid-greens with some oranges
Deuteranopes are more likely to confuse:
- Mid-reds with mid-greens
- Blue-greens with grey and mid-pinks
- Bright greens with yellows
- Pale pinks with light grey/white
- Mid-reds with mid-brown
- Light blues with lilac
Tritanopes
The most common colour confusions for tritanopes are light blues with greys, dark purples with black, mid-greens with blues and oranges with reds.
Click here to see some examples to understand the effects
Lewis pointed out that next season there will be no red away strips in the league, while the Premiership are also retiring the pink referee kit – introducing a bright orange shirt instead.
Lewis added: “This season’s final is on ITV1 for the first time, it’s on BT Sport, it is going around the world. If we get half a million people watching on ITV, there could be 40,000 people affected, and when Colour Blind Awareness have run what it would look like, it would be unwatchable.
“We flagged up the issue for the play-offs with all the clubs’ CEOs at the end of March, and it is definitely the right decision for both teams to change in the final.”