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29th Oct 2016

Premier League reveal ‘winter ball’, which is no more visible than summer ball

Can you still see the ball, son?

Mikey Stafford

Don’t forget the clocks go back tonight.

Short-term gain for long-term gain. Sure, you get an extra hour in bed to nurse your Sunday morning hangover, but come Tuesday it will be pitch dark when you go to work and pitch dark when you get home from work.

Winter is coming.

Winter is coming, which can only mean one thing! It is time for the Premier League to reveal their winter ball! Who doesn’t love that money-making racket introduced some years ago to try and squeeze some more cash out of football fans with a weakness for the latest kit?

Sure, the powers-that-be will tell you that the changed colouring is to make the ball more visible under dark winter clouds when even floodlights struggle to cut through the gloom.

That is all well and good. But when the ‘low visibility’ football looks like this, the argument for a change of ball is weakened somewhat.

MANCHESTER, ENGLAND - OCTOBER 23: The match ball is seen during the Premier League match between Manchester City and Southampton at Etihad Stadium on October 23, 2016 in Manchester, England. (Photo by Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images)

Even if the floodlights failed, an underground heating system-defying blizzard fell just before kick-off and the players were blind-folded, you could still see the retina-scorching Nike Ordem 4.

But capitalism tradition dictates that the clocks going back herald the arrival of an orange/yellow hued ball to see Nike through winter, so here it is.

Yep, 0.01% more visible than the summer ball.

Arsenal and Sunderland have the honour of playing with it first so, should the new ball be in the vicinity when an Arsenal player commits a heinous crime, Arsene Wenger will definitely still not be able to see it.

The week poor old David Moyes is having, he is sure to not see it either and be concussed by a stray Jack Rodwell crossfield ball, which rebounds off Moyes’s skull and into the Sunderland net, for a 99th minute Arsenal winner.

Winter is coming.

You can catch up on the latest episode of JOE’s Football Friday Live right here…