Back in Black: Irish company bringing black football boots back to the top

Forget your reds, whites and blues, black boots are back and an Irish company can upgrade your sharp shooters to ensure you're the coolest looking cat on the pitch.

The wheel has turned full circle, football boot hipsters. Where once players who wanted to stand out on a pitch had to wear boots of a colour that were anything but the traditional black, now it would appear as if even the slightest splash of colour is too much. Black is the new, eh, black as it were. As far as your humble author is concerned, that’s just fine. Partly because my clown-sized feet (or at least they look clown-sized in proportion to my height when my skinny legs are on display in a pair of shorts) would stand out even more in a coloured boot but mostly because I’m a traditionalist, I have always preferred straight-up black boots, particularly well-respected versions like the Adidas World Cup and Copa Mundials, the old Puma Kings, Umbro Specialis and more recently, the Adidas adiPures. Not only have all of these boots been extremely comfortable to wear but they look great too and although it would be hard to improve on their original design, they look even better when given the treatment by the folks at Blackouts, a company in Galway who provide Blackouts Treatment and stud conversion on firm ground boots. If you don’t believe us, check out Exhibit A below. The Blackouts lads were kind enough to send me on a pair of Adidas Predator LZs to showcase the services they provide and to say I was impressed with results would be an understatement. The colouring was slick and flawless and there is a lovely sheen off the finish to set them apart from your run of the mill black boots. Basically, you would recognise fairly quickly that they have had some pretty specialist work done. It’s not only me who’s been impressed with Blackout’s services either. Ciaran Murphy of Second Captains fame is a fan, while numerous inter-county GAA players - including Paul Galvin, a man who knows a thing or two about looking good - have been paying tribute on Twitter in recent weeks.  Mayo footballer and current All-Star Colm Boyle, for example, recently posted a picture of an upgraded version of his Adidas AdiPures...

Thanks to @Blackouts99 for doing a job on my boots @VaughanShoes #OnceYouGoBlack pic.twitter.com/B4XuTE0igo — Colm Boyle (@colmboyle) January 23, 2014

  ... and Galway forward Sean Armstrong tweeted his appreciation for the stud conversion on his Copa Mundials.

Sole conversion compliments of @Blackouts99. Cheers dude pic.twitter.com/gPUXY01aT2 — Sean Armstrong (@Seanarmie11) January 12, 2014

  As well as blacking out boots, Blackouts also provide a stud conversion service, which allows customers to customise the sole of moulded (Firm Ground) boots to get the mixed sole that many professionals use today and they have an exciting new product coming really soon so keep an eye on the website for details. As well as being Irish (they're based in Clonbur in Galway), Blackouts offer a wide range of excellent services, provide free shipping and will definitely appeal to the football hipster looking to get ahead of the rest in the style race as well as those of us who prefer our football boots in a colour that they were first and arguably always meant to be made. After all, once you go black... For more information on Blackouts, you can check out their website and find them on Facebook and Twitter.