The Invincibles & Beyond: Top 5 Arsenal Retro Jerseys Ranked

Let’s be honest — Arsenal kits hit different.

There’s something about this club’s history that makes their shirts feel like more than just sportswear. Maybe it’s the Wenger years. Maybe it’s the way those squads played — fluid, fearless, almost arrogant in the best possible way. Whatever it is, retro arsenal football shirts have a pull that’s hard to explain to anyone who didn’t grow up watching the Gunners.

At Flux Jersey, we’ve spent a lot of time around these shirts. We know which ones make grown men emotional at markets, and which ones sell out before we’ve even finished photographing them. So here’s our honest, slightly biased, completely unapologetic ranking of the five greatest Arsenal kits ever made.

Why Retro Arsenal Football Shirts Are Having a Moment

Walk through any major city right now and you’ll spot them. The Bruised Banana on a skateboarder in Seoul. A faded JVC home shirt tucked into wide-leg jeans in East London. An arsenal 01 02 kit on someone at a gig who definitely wasn’t alive when Wiltord scored at Old Trafford.

The “Blokecore” wave gets a lot of credit, but honestly? Arsenal’s catalog from the 90s and early 2000s would have made it regardless of fashion trends. These shirts are genuinely beautiful objects. Bold sponsors, unusual colorways, proper collars — they were made in an era when kit designers were actually taking risks.

Here are the five that stand above everything else.

5. The 1997–1998 Home Kit — Where It All Started

This one doesn’t shout. It doesn’t need to.

Deep red base, white sleeves, a heavy polo collar that feels almost old-school rugby. The JVC sponsor sits across the chest like it owns the place. It’s a proper football shirt from a proper era.

What makes this arsenal retro jersey special isn’t just the look — it’s the timing. This is the shirt from Wenger’s first Double. The season where Tony Adams was still marshalling the back four like a man possessed, and suddenly there was Bergkamp, Vieira, Overmars alongside him. Two completely different footballing philosophies somehow working in perfect harmony.

If you want a shirt that represents the beginning of something genuinely historic, this is it.

4. The arsenal 01 02 kit (Away) — The Golden One

Metallic gold. Navy trim. SEGA on the chest.

Honestly, what more needs to be said?

The arsenal 01 02 kit away shirt is one of those rare designs that somehow looks better the older it gets. At the time, gold football kits were unusual. Risky, even. Looking back, it was ahead of its time by about fifteen years.

The SEGA sponsorship gives it this brilliant retro-futuristic quality — a gaming brand on a football shirt feels completely normal now, but in 2001 it felt like a statement. Collectors absolutely love it for that reason.

And then there’s the moment permanently attached to this shirt. Sylvain Wiltord. Old Trafford. The title won in United’s own backyard. Sylvain Wiltord, in gold, at Old Trafford. That’s the kind of thing that lives forever.

3. The 1991–1993 Away Kit — The Bruised Banana

This is the one that started as a joke and ended up on the walls of art galleries. Not literally. But it should be.

Yellow base, navy chevron graphics slashing across the fabric, red collar, JVC logo. The arsenal retro jersey that basically predicted the entire maximalist fashion movement of the 2020s, thirty years early.

When it came out, people hated it. Too loud, too chaotic, too much. Now it’s the most universally recognized retro arsenal football shirt on the planet. You’ll see it on musicians, on designers, on people who have never watched a football match in their lives and genuinely don’t care — they just know it looks incredible.

If there’s one shirt in our entire catalog that belongs in a different category entirely, it’s this one. It stopped being a football shirt a long time ago.

2. The arsenal 05 06 kit (Home) — Highbury’s Last Dance

The Invincibles & Beyond: Top 5 Arsenal Retro Jerseys Ranked

This kit makes people emotional. Full stop.

The brief for the arsenal 05 06 kit must have been simple: make something worthy of saying goodbye to Highbury. What they produced was extraordinary. That dark redcurrant color — borrowed from the very first shirts worn at the ground back in 1913 — paired with gold lettering and the O2 sponsor. It’s sophisticated in a way that most football shirts simply aren’t.

And then there’s Henry.

His final season at Highbury. The hat-trick against Wigan. Getting down on his knees and kissing the turf. All of it happened in this shirt. A henry arsenal jersey in redcurrant isn’t just a piece of clothing — it’s a monument to one of the greatest players this country has ever seen. If you know, you know.

1. The arsenal 03 04 kit (Home) — The Invincibles

There was never any doubt about this one.

38 games. 26 wins. 12 draws. 0 losses.

The arsenal 03 04 kit was worn by a team that did something no one has managed since in the Premier League era. Vieira controlling games from deep. Pires drifting in from the left. Bergkamp receiving the ball with his back to goal and somehow always knowing exactly what to do next. And Henry.

The shirt itself is clean and confident — bright red body, white sleeves, O2 sponsor, modern crew neck. Nothing fussy. Nothing overdone. Just a great football shirt worn by an extraordinary football team.

The number 14. That’s the one everyone wants. A henry arsenal jersey from the Invincibles season is the crown jewel — 30 goals, a title won without losing once, and a level of individual performance that still feels slightly unreal when you watch it back.

When you wear the arsenal 03 04 kit, you’re wearing something that will never need an explanation. Every football fan in the world knows what it means.

Find Yours at Flux Jersey

Original versions of these shirts in good condition are genuinely hard to find — and when you do find them, the printing is often cracked, the fabric is thin, or the sizing is completely off.

That’s exactly why Flux Jersey exists. We make premium remakes of football’s most important shirts, built with the details that actually matter:

Accurate colorways — the redcurrant on the arsenal 05 06 kit is the right shade. The gold on the arsenal 01 02 kit actually catches the light.
Proper player printing — want a henry arsenal jersey with era-accurate numbering? We do it properly, not as an afterthought.
Wearable fabric — these aren’t display pieces. They’re made to be worn, whether you’re at a match or just out on a Saturday.
Honest pricing — collecting shouldn’t cost a fortune. Our retro arsenal football shirts are priced for real fans.

The Invincibles won’t come around again. But the shirts are still here.

Browse the full collection at Flux Jersey — come on you Gunners.

Flux Jersey Editorial Team

The Flux Jersey Editorial Team publishes practical football jersey buying, sizing, fit, and care guides. Articles are updated when product information or store policies change.