Finland Channels History, Flag for Nike Olympic Jerseys

The Finnish National Team unveiled their new Nike designed 2014 Winter Olympic hockey jerseys today, designs based heavily on their hockey history and their national flag.

Like the Czech Republic jerseys unveiled last month Team Finland will be wearing a light-coloured jersey which is basically their flag fashioned into the shape of a hockey jersey. The Finnish coat of arms is in the upper left corner of the chest and “SUOMI”, which is Finland in Finnish is spelled out on the right arm. Nike swoosh right on the upper cross of the flag.

Finland Flag Hockey Jersey 2014 Olympics — The white jersey design is based entirely off of the flag of Finland

The dark jerseys have a dark blue shoulder yoke with a light blue base, two Finnish flags make up the sleeve striping design. On the chest is the coat of arms with SUOMI arched above in red. The logo design is very reminiscent of what the Finland national team wore up through 1976, finally resurrecting it for 2010 and again in 2014.

On the shoulders of the dark blue jersey there is a sublimated shiny lion-wielding-a-sword design (this might also possibly be on the white flag jerseys but we can’t see it in the photos we have). The lion is taken right from the Coat of Arms seen on the chest of the blue jersey and upper corner of the white. The Nike fake collar or “FlyWire” is also present on these jerseys.

Finland Shoulder Detail — The lion from the Finnish coat of arms is on each shoulder of the blue

How does this jersey compare with those of Finland’s Olympic hockey past, well, let’s take a look from 1972 right up to today:

I’m really diggin’ the double blue with the red SUOMI across the front, and while I love the idea of the white flag jersey I’m not sure it’s lending itself to a good hockey jersey design.