A Welsh grassroots club has partnered with four famous bands for their 2026/27 season team kits.
Welsh groups Super Furry Animals and Panic Shack as well as Mogwai and Loose Articles will appear on the front of Cwmbran Celtic AFC men’s and women’s first-team home and away shirts.
The profits from each shirt will raise money for the club while also supporting grassroots music venues, with 10% of profits going to a UK music charity.
The Torfaen club said the bands “embraced the idea” as a way to link grassroots football and grassroots music, as they both “are fighting the same fight” for the future.
Matt Jarrett, joint commercial manager for the club, said the idea to bring together musicians and football clubs for the team kit came from his and fellow commercial manager Connor Cupples’ links with the Welsh music scene.
“Connor and I used to put gigs on together,” he explained.
“We were in the pub, at the away bar at Carmarthen Town AFC, when we had the idea. We thought it’d be good fun.”
The pair had both worked with Super Furry Animals before and decided to try their luck.
The Welsh rock band previously appeared on a Cardiff City shirt back in 1999.
“It was really good of them to say yes,” Matt said, “as they’ve just been touring and releasing their own merch recently too”.
The pair messaged a few bands and said through a combination of contacts and friends willing to help out they managed to get four bands involved.
The Super Furry Animals found fame in 1996 after the release of their album English-language Fuzzy Logic, grabbing headlines for their unusual promotional tactics, including giant inflatable bears.
Front man Gruff Rhys said: “Our 50 foot high inflatable bears have a long standing relationship with Cwmbran having been patched up there from many punctures over the last thirty years.
“The bears were very keen to repay the favour and this beautiful football kit was born.”
Matt said Manchester-based punk band Loose Articles were the first band to come on board, as the drummer’s mum lives in Cwmbran, as well as Welsh band Panic Shack.
Glasgow post-rock band Mogwai, who are Celtic fans, feature on the green-and-white men’s away shirt.
Most of the money raised from the sales of the shirts will go directly towards supporting the club’s many teams, including six senior sides, veterans, walking football and a full junior set-up.
Cwmbran Celtic AFC said 10% of the profit will also go to Music Venue Trust, a charity established in 2014 to protect, secure and improve grassroots music venues in the UK.
Matt said the link with the Music Venue Trust also came over a pint in a pub.
“We realised that trying to get people to come to grassroots football is exactly the same as trying to get people to come to a grassroots music venue”, he said, with both trying to get “bums on seats” and promote themselves on social media.
Connor said: “Grassroots football and grassroots music venues are fighting the same fight. They’re where it all starts, they run on passion and tight budgets, and when one disappears a community loses something it can’t easily get back.”
He added this year’s kit stands for far more than a season of football.
“It’s two grassroots worlds looking out for each other.”
Toni Coe-Brooker, of Music Venue Trust, said: “This partnership perfectly captures what grassroots culture is all about. Whether it’s a football club or a music venue, these are the places where communities come together and futures begin.”
