When Newport County run out against Barnet on Tuesday evening, they will be wearing red-and-white stripes. The compelling story behind it is not just powerful – it has succeeded in winning this Welsh club new followers around the world.
The away kit is a nod to the colours of Athletic Club of Bilbao and honours the Basque children of 1937 taken in by the Welsh people. During the Spanish Civil War, with the region under attack by Francisco Franco, they were fleeing their war-torn homeland.
There were 236 Basque children who escaped the bombing there, finding a new home in Wales, with 56 of them located near Newport in Caerleon. The boys’ football skills made them local legends but the tale was not widely known beyond the area – until now.
It has captured the imagination 88 years on. “It has really flown,” Neal Heard tells Sky Sports. “We have sold more shirts overseas than locally. It has gone really well but it is not just about the pure numbers. The story behind it seems to have really resonated.”
Heard, Newport County’s creative director, is the man behind the project. A self-confessed “historian nerd”, he has a personal link to the story as he is related to one of the Basque children. “It was close to my heart anyway but it is a story that links the community.”
He was moved to tears when he watched the final video and has been overwhelmed by the personal stories that have been shared. “I was speaking to one of the descendants who said that his father did not go back home because his dad had been shot by the firing squad. The manager of the football team actually fostered him.”
That example feels particularly pertinent in the current climate in which empathy for refugees is not always obvious. “I think it maybe humanises that debate a bit,” adds Heard. “We have the name of each child on every shirt. The past is still relevant.”
Newport paired with the right club in that sense. “They are all about memory, all about identity, all about solidarity. They see this as a way of thanking the Welsh people for showing friendship in hard times. They saw that this was a really special story,” he says.
“I knew it was very important to the Basques. I did not know how important it was until we went over for the photo shoot and spoke to people, and so many people were like, oh, my grandfather was this and that, and it was then that it really brought it home.
“I would never have dreamed Athletic would support us this much. Ordinarily, if Newport were knocking on the door of the big boys, it would be thanks but no thanks. But they were just as excited as us. That is when I knew it would be something special.”
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“I cried,” says Neal Heard, creative director at Newport County, when discussing the club’s new away shirt that pays homage to the Basque refugees taken in by Wales in 1937
The role of creative director is common in the world of fashion but not football, not even at the elite level. “When I say to people that I am creative director at Newport County, people are like, does the thing even exist?” But this success more than vindicates it.
Heard credits the club’s chief operating officer Jonathan Wilsher for having the imagination to agree to the role. “He was somebody, as a supporter, who I would have wanted in the club,” he says. “They want to do good and they were also open to change.”
Heard, who heads his own creative agency Lover’s FC, had already made a splash through a tie-in with Welsh rock band Skindred late last year. “This was the follow up.” Thinking outside the box has been essential in spreading the word about Newport.
He is the first to admit that there has not been too much to shout about on the pitch. “Unfortunately, it is my hometown club,” he says with the gallows humour of a true fan. “There is a history which would make a grown man weep. You could not make it up.”
Newport have played only two seasons in the second tier of the football pyramid. The first was curtailed due to the Second World War. The second ended with them relegated in last place. That was 78 years ago. They have been out of business since then.
The club finally bounced back to the Football League after a quarter of a century away in 2013 and have spent the past dozen years in League Two, twice missing out on winning promotion through the playoffs due to controversial defeats in extra-time at Wembley.
“What stories about Newport reach the world? That is what I am trying to do. But we are a tiny little club. We have got to kind of punch above our weight. We do not want to do that in an overtly commercial way. I think there is too much of that already out there.”
In Wales alone, competition is fierce. “Our neighbours in the north are now owned by Ryan Reynolds and out-punching everybody. Swansea have just got Snoop Dogg in their shirt. What are we going to do to stay relevant? To get the message out there is difficult.”
Newport County’s new away shirt being proudly displayed in Bilbao
In an industry in which every club seems to be competing for eyeballs, Heard realised that the question that Newport had to ask themselves was simple. “How can we make ourselves stand out?” Finding an answer to that question was the difficult part.
“You cannot just say, here is a crazy kit or something like that. I think storytelling is a massive thing. Everyone is scrambling for attention in this new world. But how can you give yourself a unique selling point? If the stories have heart, that is a good start.”
Newport County’s shirt celebrates the relationship between Wales and the Basque Country
There are some limits. They chose the away kit, obviously. “The home is sacrosanct.” Heard was with the Cardiff City fans who protested when their shirt was changed from blue to red in 2012. But even this switch has been met with some fan criticism.
“I knew there would be a noisy minority asking why we are wearing red and white. If you do not like the kit then fine. Aesthetics are down to the individual, aren’t they? One man’s meat is another man’s poison. But just stop and think about the bigger picture.
Newport County’s away shirt supplied by VX3 being modelled in Bilbao
“We are Newport County. We nearly went down last year. We have not got a great deal of money. This has brought in loads of revenue that the club desperately needs. If you cannot see that this is going to help the club then there is something wrong with you.
“And we all want to help the club. I am a member of the Trust, I have been for years. We all give. Every month I give them money. I still do. I want the club to live, you know, and that is what we have got to do. This is important and luckily it has gone really well.”
The shirt unveiling made headlines around the world but the best is still to come. Having missed the pre-season friendly against Torquay where it was worn, Heard admits he “might get a bit emotional” when he sees the team run out in the kit for the first time.
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Beyond that, there are plans for a contingent from Newport – including Heard and a descendant of the Basque children – to go to Bilbao and present the shirt, where it will take its place in the Athletic Club museum. “We will be their official guests delivering the shirt. A Welsh choir is going over,” he says.
“That will be a spine tingler, if I am honest, to have descendants at the game. There is also a group called the ‘Children of 37’ who helped us greatly, alongside VX3, the kit supplier, in putting the kit together with the history and the names of the kids to go on it.
“I am not soppy but I do not think there will be a better time in my ‘kit life’ than taking that shirt to Bilbao. Without wanting to sound like a gushing schoolboy, I did not think it was going to be as good as this has ended up.” No pressure to top it with the next idea, then.
He laughs. “The next one, if I can pull it off, will be another cracker.”
Heard suspects that there will be more creative directors in football in the future and he is surely right. But who knows what this club can achieve before then? “I have had messages from around the world from people saying they support Newport County now.”
