Spotted yesterday on Twitter from the American online magazine Slate:
Obviously, Slate is using “kit” for what an American would usually call a jersey or shirt. My question is, would a British person refer to “France kit” or “French kit”?
Spotted yesterday on Twitter from the American online magazine Slate:
Obviously, Slate is using “kit” for what an American would usually call a jersey or shirt. My question is, would a British person refer to “France kit” or “French kit”?
notoneoffbritishisms.com 
In my book, “kit” means the whole thing, shirt, shorts, socks and anything else that springs to mind. Here it looks like we’re just talking about France’s new shirt.
Yes, “kit” would refer to the whole outfit – the shirt is just a shirt. Well, not just a shirt. It’s usually also a symbol of the team. You talk about a player’s fitness to wear “the shirt”; a player says he’s proud “to wear the shirt”, and if he isn’t he doesn’t belong in the side. A player’s dream is “to wear the shirt”.
No one, as far as I know, is proud to wear the kit.
Yes, but they do say a pair of pyjamas so they are obviously talking about the whole kit. And I would say the England (not English) kit, so would also say the France (not French) kit. I think I might also say French though, it’s interchangeable I suppose.
Agree with above, ‘kit’ is the whole thing but I think I’d say ‘French kit’. Although, thinking about it, ‘the England kit’ sounds better than ‘the English kit’. Hmm, think I’ve changed my mind!
Ah .. so close. It’s “French kit” …
Is it though, why do we say the England kit and not the France kit? You’re right though, when I saw it out loud it does sound wrong.
Kit refers to the whole athletic outfit not the jersey.
France kit. And my pyjamas don’t look like that…
Strictly speaking, as the France kit is manufactured by Nike, it is American.
I read “France kit” and I think of the whole outfit “France” is wearing as a football team, even though there’s only the shirt in the photo. I wouldn’t say “the Germany kit”, though, rather “the German kit looks like…”.
“the England kit” :: “the England team”
“the French kit” :: “the French team”
“the France kit”??? just possibly – *”the France team” – definitely no.
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I (BrE) would say the England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales kits/teams, but the French,German, Italian etc. kits/teams.
Is it a home nations thing perhaps?
Kit would refer to the whole strip/outfit e.g the top, shorts and socks.
I can see from this photo of the France Euro 2016 kit http://www.footyheadlines.com/2016/03/france-euro-2016-kit.html why the American tweeter thought of pyjamas. It does look distinctly “droopy drawers”.
We would say “France kit”, I think. We are used to hearing “the England kit” but “France kit” feels unfamiliar and slightly odd, when normally we would use “French” for anything French. We just don’t often say it or hear it said and I wouldn’t feel immediately certain about it.
Looking online to see what the Azzurri are wearing, I’ve found “Italy Kit” or “Italia kit”. From the same website as the photo above: “The new Italy Euro 2016 Pre-Match Kit introduces a striking design for [the] Gli Azzurri, set to be worn ahead of their Euro 2016 matches. Puma also released three different Italy Training Shirts for the tournament in France.”
In cricket, ‘kit’ means all your equipment including stuff like the bat, helmet, gloves, pads etc., as well as your actual clothes. I would concur that it’s ‘the England kit’ and I’m just rehearsing in my head ‘the Netherlands kit’, the Spain kit’, ‘the Brazil kit’. But yes, i think it’s ‘the French kit’. WHYYYYY??
I get the feeling that i the U.S., “kit” is used for “uniform” in the context of Euro-centric sports like soccer and cycling.
Also interesting here is the BrE “pyjamas” and AmE “pajamas”. I’ve gotten into trouble here for spelling it “wrong”.
(BTW, despite my use of logical punctuation above, I was born and raised in the U.S.)
One would say ‘have you seen the new France kit?’, but you could also refer to the ‘French kit getting stolen’. In both cases it would refer to the whole ensemble.
French cigarettes, French Kiss, French Letters, French tail lights (apologies to Jan and Dean.) I’m sure it is known in Europe as France Kit in BrE. In case anyone is interested, there is a serious yacht race taking place at the moment in Europe. “The Round Ireland Race?”About 740 miles. It started today from Wicklow and at the moment an American monohull is 1st overall in IRC. “Rambler 88”
Now that’s a nice bit of Kit.
I don’t know how the question mark got there! The race is definitely the “Round Ireland Yacht Race.”
Here’s an article about ripped Swiss kit uses the terms shirt, jersey and kit somewhat interchangeably. https://www.theguardian.com/football/2016/jun/20/xherdan-shaqiri-switzerland-shirts-puma-produce-condoms
France kit. Because it’s the kit of the team called France.
PSG’s kit is a French kit, but it’s not the France kit.
Looks like Slate missed a chance to re-spell ‘pyjamas’ to match their use of ‘kit’
Playing strip.In English and european football teams change their strips regularly because the teams and manufacturers get a percentage on the replica shirts sold to fans.The national teams are exactly the same for a world cup or euro championship just bring out a new strip the fans will be stupid enough to buy them.
Generally “the French kit” or “France’s kit”, but “the France kit” is not entirely wrong.
The “rule”, if it is such a thing. does get confused however with home nations. “The England kit” would be more common I think than “English”, “Scotland” more common than “Scottish” (or “Scots” – really that descriptive noun is a minefield).